Anarchy
by L.M.Lewis
Summary: A case with roots going back sixteen years finally looks like it may come to trial, if they can find a judge who's willing to risk taking on the people who are opposed to it.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: These characters are not mine and I make no profit from them. This story and all the characters in it are fictional.

Thanks, Owl and Cheri.

**Author's Note:** For those who haven't had recent access to the original episodes, this piece is rife with references to the plot of the second season episode, "The Birthday Present", in which Hardcastle is recalled to the bench to hear the case of Weed Randall, a soon to be paroled murderer, on a new charge of murder. Acting as his own counsel, Randall pays for a gun to be smuggled into court and, at the outset of the trial, shoots the judge in the chest.

**Anarchy**

by L.M. Lewis

"You gotta uphold the law. You bend it just a little, try and look the other way just once, and you have the beginnings of anarchy."

The Black Widow, scene 18

**Chapter One—A Librarian At Large**

It was his first week off since starting law school full time. After a summer semester of compressed classes, Mark was half-hoping that the judge would continue his moratorium on riding the high plains in search of bad guys. It looked that way, with no files in sight on that hot August morning, only a copy of the LA Times out on the patio table.

The sports section had obviously already had a going-over. It was lying on the seat of an unoccupied chair. Hardcastle had proceeded on to the front section and had it folded back to a manageable size, still reading while he buttered his toast.

Mark grabbed for the Dodgers' headlines and set his cereal bowl down on the table in front of him. He heard Hardcastle grunt.

"They're extraditing him, Arthur Loki." He sat back a bit and shook his head.

"The bomb guy," Mark asked casually, slipping his spoon out of the hip pocket where he'd stowed it, and reaching for the pitcher of orange juice.

"Yeah," Hardcastle cocked a pondering eye upward, "wonder if they'll want my notes—"

"You were in on that?"

"Uh-huh. The presiding judge after the first trial went up for grabs."

Mark frowned in puzzlement. "I didn't know there'd been a second trial."

"'Course not. 'Cause I didn't let 'em turn it into a three-ring media circus that time. And all the rest of the bunch were tried, found guilty, and sentenced. All except for Loki, who beat feet out of state."

"Took a while for them to find him."

Hardcastle tilted his head back, eyes briefly closed, as if he were doing some calculations. He brought his chin back down, sharply, after a moment. "Sixteen years—it was 1970. Looks like he spent most of it up in Oregon. Just lucky someone finally recognized him there."

"Not lucky for him," Mark mused, turning to the box scores. "Musta been lying pretty low—they say he was working as a librarian, right? Probably thought he was out of the woods after all that time."

He'd immersed himself further in the previous evening's late-season pitchers' duel. The silence went unnoticed by him at first, but eventually it became a little more . . . _penetrating_. He glanced up and saw the stare Hardcastle was giving him.

Mark frowned. "I missed something here, huh?"

The judge shook his head, a gesture that might have indicated a situation past salvaging.

"What?" Mark insisted with slight exasperation. "You know, I was in juvie that year; we didn't get no regular newspaper deliveries."

He'd layered the accent on a bit heavier than usual, along with his best Dead End Kid double negative. He'd pried a small smile from the older man, but it was transmuted quickly into something grimmer.

"You've at least got an excuse. For most folks, even the ones who are old enough and lived here then, it's just yesterday's news. There was even some talk about not bothering with the extradition."

"It did sound like he'd cleaned up his act."

"Yeah," Hardcastle grunted, "that's what they're saying."

"But . . .?"

There was another silence, and then Hardcastle shook his head again slowly, and said, "Nobody came to the funeral. Well, hardly anyone. Me and one of the detectives from the investigation. There wasn't even anyone from the university." He shrugged. "The man didn't have any kids, and his ex-wife had moved away."

"Whose funeral?" Mark asked cautiously.

"The guy who wasn't supposed to be killed by that last bomb. He was a security guard over at the university. They'd been pretty careful up till then, I'll grant you. Lots of showy stuff—red paint on the walls of the ROTC headquarters, smoke bombs in the administration building—but this time they decided they'd use a real one to blow up a chemistry lab—they said it was because one of the professors in the department had taken grant money from the Defense Department."

"And the guy . . . ?"

"Was supposed to be on the other side of campus, responding to a fake call about a possible fire. Only his radio malfunctioned and he never got the call—that's what they think. He was inside the building when the bomb exploded."

Mark swallowed hard. "Killed, huh?"

"Uh-uh. Just burned: face, hands. Cut up pretty bad, too. Deaf in one ear—they couldn't fix that. And his head was never right after that—that's what I heard. He got some money from the university—enough to live on, not enough to get his life back. There's never enough for that." Hardcastle's eyes went a little darker and more distant. "Then about four years later he died."

"From his injuries?" Mark asked.

"From not wanting to live anymore," the judge said soberly.

Mark said nothing to that. There didn't seem to be anything _to_ say.

Hardcastle heaved a sigh and got to his feet. "I should go rustle up my notes."

00000

It was two days later, Monday morning, and Hardcastle's appointment with the DA in charge of the Loki indictments was looking like it might be a problem.

"An hour and a half ought to have been plenty of time," Mark said, lifting his hands from the steering wheel and running them through his hair in a gesture of frustration. Keeping them _on_ the wheel was pointless, since they weren't moving at all. The Santa Monica Freeway was at a dead standstill.

"Maybe the side streets," he muttered, but even getting to the next ramp wasn't going to happen very soon. They'd already listened to two cycles of the radio traffic reports and aside from stating the obvious—nothing was moving—the announcers didn't have any useful advice.

Hardcastle was looking out his side of the Coyote. On the shoulder was yet another stalled car though, unlike the usual cause of a slowdown, there was no relief from the crunch after they'd edged past it.

"Did you see that?" he glanced over at McCormick, who was closing the infinitesimally small gap between them and the car ahead, taking some satisfaction in having moved three feet.

There was nothing but a questioning grunt from the younger man's direction and then finally, "See what?"

"The tires on that thing."

Mark shook his head.

"Two of 'em," the judge looked back toward the sidelined vehicle, "flat."

Mark shrugged and cast his own quick look. "Happens. Might be a spilled load along here. Something sharp. That'd explain all this," he gestured impatiently.

"Yeah," Hardcastle said, then shook his head and turned forward again, "makes sense, I suppose . . . maybe." He checked his watch again. "It's hopeless. Just get off at La Brea."

"But—"

"We can call 'em from Frank's office." He thumbed impatiently through his file. "I wanna check a couple things."

00000

Mark's foreboding had been right. The freeway mess had oozed out onto the secondary roads and the remainder of their drive cut deep into the morning. Everything was up for grabs at the station house too, with the usual borderline confusion taxed to the point of chaos.

Frank was on the phone, a precinct map spread in front of him on his desk. He barely acknowledged the arrival of his visitors with a duck of his chin. They found their own seats, though Hardcastle was up on his feet a moment later, wandering restlessly.

A quick good-bye and Frank had cradled the receiver. To them he was equally curt.

"Bad timing, guys, got a lot on my plate this morning."

"What the hell is going on out there?" Mark asked.

"What isn't?" The lieutenant shook his head and leaned back over his map. He was reaching for the phone again when Hardcastle interrupted him.

"The freeways," he murmured, "it's all of them?"

"Looks like it," Frank nodded.

"A fluke?" The judge asked grimly. "Or has somebody noticed some kind of M.O.?"

Frank looked up from his pondering of the map. "Not sure about the noticing part, but they're sure as hell _worried_ about it. So far, though, it's got fluke written on it. More then the usual number of flats, I'll grant you, and somebody down on the 405 reported a road hazard took down an 18-wheeler—that was when it all went to hell in a hand basket."

"A two-by-four about six feet long with spikes driven through it in both directions," Hardcastle said in a quiet measured way, as though he were quoting from somewhere.

"You heard?" Frank frowned. "I thought they were gonna try and keep that out of the news reports."

Hardcastle shook his head. "Not heard, just guessed."

Harper's frown deepened. "Who?" he asked.

"Exhibit fifteen," Hardcastle said, leafing through the thick folder he had carried up from the car. "The Red Fist Trial. It was in one of the documents found in Peter Solanger's apartment. The experts testified it was Arthur Loki's handwriting." He'd fished it out and was holding it at a reading distance. "'Ways and Means of Bringing About the Revolution'." Hardcastle sighed wearily and added, "It's handy when they're pithy like that."

He handed the paper-clipped sheaf over to Frank.

"It was a blueprint, of sorts. During the first trial, Loki argued that it was all theory—strictly academic stuff—but Solanger was more up-front about it. Of course he was the one whose fingerprints were found on the bomb materials in the basement storage area."

Frank was flipping through the pages slowly. "And the two-by-fours?"

"Page five, I think. There's a whole section in there about ways of immobilizing cities. They never got around to doing any of that stuff."

"You think—?"

"The others are all out now and who knows how many fellow-believers they had that never even got caught."

"Nobody's claiming any responsibility—"

"Oh," Hardcastle glanced up at the wall clock, "they still have plenty of time to make the evening news . . . if that's what they want."

Frank had only opened his mouth before he was interrupted by the phone. He reached for it, still glaring down at the papers he'd been handed. A hello and a yes that was little more than a grunt and he capped the mouthpiece with his palm.

"For you. How the hell—?"

"The DA?" Hardcastle shrugged. "Called 'em from the sergeant's desk." He reached for the phone and the conversation went monosyllabic.

Mark slid over closer to the desk and silently negotiated his share of the manifesto from Harper. They were both still poring over it when the judge cradled the receiver.

"Like I thought," he laid the rest of the file down on the desk and gathered in the pieces of exhibit fifteen, "no press conference on this one."

"Huh?" Mark clung to his pages for a moment but gave in after only a brief tug.

"It's now the Red Fist in the velvet glove, looks like. Someone called the mayor's office—the offer is that the DA elects not to prosecute and what happened this morning gets to stay just a convergence of bad luck, never to be seen again."

"And if not?" Mark asked.

"No specific threats. I guess we're supposed to consult the guide book." He glanced down at the papers he was tucking back into the file. "There's plenty to choose from."

Frank grimaced. "This could get a whole lot worse."

"It might," Hardcastle acknowledged, "but I'm guessing the DA is already having second thoughts about the logistics of prosecuting a sixteen-year-old case."

"It was murder," Mark said quietly, almost to himself. Then, almost sheepishly, he added, "Well, it might have been. Under the provisions of section 194 . . ."

Harper shot a quick glance at Hardcastle. "Now you got him buying into it, too, huh?"

"Can't help it if the kid knows his way around the penal code. They teach 'em that stuff in law school, you know."

"Well," Frank said reluctantly, "there was no question it was aggravated battery, but you know the burden of proof starts to pile up pretty high when the victim dies that far out. Juries don't like that kind of stuff, and you'll notice nobody hauled the rest of them back into court for a new trial twelve years ago."

"'Course not," Hardcastle said with a hint of anger. "They were already in prison. The prosecutors didn't want it to look like overkill. But now they're out, and if Solanger and his cadre are still in the revolution business, we've got that one last charge all ready to go. No statute of limitations on murder, and none at all for Loki, even on the old charges, not with him taking off in mid-trial." He slapped his hands together, looking like a man who was anticipating a good fight.

He gathered up the file and tucked it under his arm again. "But we gotta run." There was a quick nod toward McCormick and then he jerked his chin toward the door. "The appointment's still on."


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two—A Judge **_**Pro Tem**_

Their meeting with the DA included a late-addition liaison from the mayor's office and edged past lunch time. Hardcastle's file was produced and inspected. Ted Briston, the most senior of the DA's guys assigned to the case, was just old enough to have been around the office the first time out, but hadn't been involved in either of the other two trials.

"The breakout," he said, "I remember that. It led to a whole overhaul of prisoner transportation policies. Still, I'd have to say that except for Loki getting away, the end result was a slam dunk for us. For one thing, the judge at the new trial was a lot more amenable to the prosecution's viewpoint."

If he'd meant it to be an icebreaker, it failed entirely. Mark felt the temperature in the room drop considerably and Hardcastle looked as though he were gritting his teeth before he finally said, almost formally, "I ran my courtroom according to the law of the State of California and the rules for proper procedure, that's all."

Briston looked slightly taken aback at the reception of what he'd undoubtedly intended as a compliment. His original smile went a little stiff. Dan Kohler, the guy from the mayor's office—with his politician's tan and straight teeth—was either oblivious or disregarding. He'd been fidgeting since he'd gotten there, the last one in and looking eager to be somewhere else the minute he arrived.

"I'd like to state right from the start," he interjected smoothly, "that the mayor has no intention of directing the activities of the prosecutor's office—"

"On account of he has no prerogatives in such matters," Hardcastle finished for him, equally smooth.

Kohler squinted at him briefly, then self-consciously relaxed his expression and nodded very slightly just once. He didn't refute the judge's statement, but added, "I am simply here to remind the district attorney's office of the discretionary powers inherent in the system. There is no absolute _requirement_ to prosecute every case that is presented."

"A handful of nails on the 405 and they've already got you running scared." Hardcastle shook his head.

Kohler drew himself up. "This morning's activities have nothing to do with our stance. It's a mere issue of resources—what it will take to bring this trial to a successful conclusion."

"You stick to that story. Besides, every trial that ends in a verdict has a successful conclusion."

Both the other men were now giving the judge puzzled stares. Mark eased back in his seat, already anticipating the punch line, but even he was taken aback by Hardcastle's sudden intensity as he added, "It wasn't like the case against Loki was cut and dried."

"He ran," Mark pointed out.

Hardcastle shrugged. "All along he said he'd said he'd been roped in by mistake."

Mark frowned. "But the manifesto, the plans in _his_ handwriting."

"He claimed it was just first amendment stuff and he never intended it to be more than that—a political statement and a theoretical exercise, not an actual blueprint. He said Solanger had gotten his hands on it and used it to coerce him into further participation—it was either help them or the manifesto would be circulated to the regents of the university. Loki was a graduate student, a teaching assistant. It would have been the end of his academic career. Anyway," the judge pinched the bridge of his nose, "the break-out—all of the defendants were in the same transport vehicle. An explosion in the street, a lot of diversion, everything up for grabs, and before it was over, two of the sheriff's deputies had fired shots. I suppose he should have stood there, with his hands up in the air."

Mark's expression hadn't cleared. "Then what was all that stuff about the security guard, and justice finally being served?"

"Like I said, trials can have a successful conclusion no matter what the verdict. But there's supposed to _be_ a verdict—or at least a finding by the jury that no verdict can be reached. Some sort of _closure_, that's all." Hardcastle stepped back from the higher theory for a moment and looked stern. "I gotta say, though, if his old buddies from the Fist are going to bat for him, it looks a lot more like he was a card-carrying member. And I'm not saying his flight won't make the rest of his defense a lot tougher to sell."

The conversation had wandered off-point, and both Kohler and Briston seemed irritated. Kohler jumped back in first, still looking eager to be out of there.

"If there _is_ going to be a prosecution," he said, with evident disapproval, "the mayor would at least hope, in the interests of public safety, that the proceedings will be swift."

Both Briston and Hardcastle gave him the jaundiced look of experience, but he ignored them. He gathered his things and stood, aiming one passing shot mostly at Hardcastle.

"If this morning's events really were a first salvo, we won't be able to keep this under wraps for very long. Once it's out, we'll see how much the average citizen believes in your legal philosophy, Judge Hardcastle."

Then, with no more than a quick nod, he departed, taking very little of the tension of the room with him. Briston let out a heavy breath and finally turned back to the judge.

"He wants swift—everybody wants swift. Have any of them looked at the dockets these days? Not enough judges _or_ courtrooms."

"Then you're going ahead with the prosecution?"

"That's the plan. You know the DA doesn't like it when outside agencies try to interfere."

"He's right, though," Hardcastle gestured toward the door Kohler had departed through, "if this gets ugly, a lot of people are gonna be wondering what the point is. Unless . . ."

Mark had heard it, the barely contained enthusiasm—the idea of striking two blows for justice with a single effort.

"If these guys do make another move, or if we find evidence of conspiracy from this morning's debacle, the responsible parties could be rounded up. And like I said, there's no statute of limitations on the death that was a consequence of the 1970 bombing. Try 'em together or try 'em apart. Either way, they're off the street and kept out of mischief while Loki finally has his day in court."

He was separating out the copies of the papers he'd brought for the DA's files. Mark got to his feet. He heard Hardcastle say, still with a clearly audible eagerness to his tone, "Let me know if there's anything else I can do."

00000

They were in the car before Mark said anything about it and when he did, he approached it cautiously.

"One more week and classes start up again."

Hardcastle grunted in acknowledgment.

"We have a deal, right?" Mark added with a tad more insistence. "You still agree to it?"

He cast a quick sideward glance at the man. Hardcastle's eyebrow had risen.

Mark let out a sigh of near-exasperation. "I mean about you not doing the Lone Ranger thing when I'm not around to ride shotgun. _That_ deal."

Now the older man looked mystified. "It was just digging up an old file and getting the assistant DA up to speed and, _besides_, you were right there the whole time."

"It's not the damn file," Mark took his eyes off the road again for a moment, partly to roll them, partly to briefly glare at the judge. "All that talk back there about getting that trial underway and a shortage of judges. I could see you lighting up like a kid on Christmas morning."

This time Hardcastle wasn't quite so quick with the repost, another bad sign, but when he'd finally framed his response it had a certain glibness to it.

"I don't know what's got you all riled up. Nobody's asked me to do anything but give 'em what I had for background information."

Mark knew a waffle when he saw one. He intended to nail the answer down a little more firmly.

"If they _did_ ask, if they wanted to recall you to the bench again for this trial, what would you say?"

He didn't regret that he was driving; it gave him somewhere else to direct his gaze other than toward the judge. The long pause that followed the question would have turned his glance into a stare.

Hardcastle finally jumped right over the yes and into his self-defense. "Sitting in as a temporary judge isn't the same as riding off after some bad guys solo."

Mark couldn't help it; his first unthinking response was an unstifled groan. He was shaking his head.

"Well, it's not," the judge said staunchly.

"I'll be back in school. I'll have class."

"It's not like I'd need a Tonto—I'll have a bailiff, for chrissake."

"You had a bailiff last time," Mark pointed out.

"And you were there, too," Hardcastle said practically. "It wasn't one of those things anybody could have predicted or reacted to quick enough."

"Exactly . . . but you'd say yes anyway."

"Thousands of judges get up and go to work every morning—"

"This Red Fist group, they're already threatening to stop the trial."

"And that means there'll be heightened security. Look, kid, I already presided over one of these and . . . besides, _somebody_ has to do it."

"But why you?" Mark asked stubbornly.

00000

Eventually they'd dropped the argument, partly because it was obvious that neither one of them was giving in, and partly because, in the absence of any invitation, it was strictly theoretical. The next morning the paper was singularly uninformative about the previous day's unusual traffic patterns. It also said nothing more about the Loki proceedings.

The other shoe didn't drop until the following week. Monday's paper had announced, in a small article buried on page fourteen, that the case of _California v. Arthur Loki_ would finally be proceeding, after its sixteen-year hiatus. There was the standard quote from the defendant's appointed public defender that his client looked forward to this opportunity to finally establish his innocence and put the old charges to rest.

"Next thing you know," Hardcastle grumped over breakfast, "he'll be complaining that 'justice delayed is justice denied'."

Mark had no comment to make on that prediction. He was only delighted to read that the preliminaries had taken place in the courtroom of the Honorable Judge Robinson.

On Monday evening, the lead story was, once again, the unholy mess that had been the evening's rush hour traffic, with the blame being placed on a half dozen oil spills, regrettably placed for maximum effect on the web of freeway interchanges. In the middle of this news, the suspicious fire in Topanga Canyon that had damaged three homes earlier that day, including that of Judge Robinson's eldest daughter, went almost uncommented upon.

The call came on Tuesday morning. Hardcastle picked it up. Mark had already scraped and washed his breakfast plate and was heading for the door. Something in Hardcastle's expression as the judge took the call made Mark freeze in his tracks and turn to listen.

"I'd be honored" was the catch phrase that hammered home the certainty of it. Hardcastle had always thought it a privilege to serve the law, no matter what the personal cost. Mark wasn't sure his own generosity extended that far.

"They asked, huh?" he said, trying for calm acceptance as the judge hung up the phone. "And you said yes."

Hardcastle at least had the decency to not look delighted about it this time, though it was pretty evident that he was pleased. He cleared his throat and said, soberly, "They'll have extra security in the courtroom—and here, too. I'll make sure Frank's in charge of that. He was involved in the original investigation. He knows the Fist and what they can pull off."

"_Knew_," Mark corrected. "That was sixteen years ago. This may even be a whole different group."

Hardcastle shrugged. "You trust Frank, don'tcha? He's a careful guy."

"More careful than you," Mark huffed, then looked down at his watch. "What happens today?"

"'Today'?" Hardcastle grinned. "You've got civil procedure at ten-thirty, right?"

"Not if you have pretrial hearings at eleven-fifteen," Mark shot back, preparing to stand his ground.

"Nah," the judge shook his head, "nobody's _that_ swift. The parties involved have to be notified and you can bet Loki's lawyer will mount an objection in there somewhere."

Mark wasn't moving toward the door. Beyond his still deep concerns, this exercise in criminal law sounded a lot more interesting than anything Professor Twiggins would have to say this morning.

"Wait'll the PD finds out you're the only guy around who thinks his client might be innocent."

"That's irrelevant. I don't have those kinds of opinions when I'm sitting on the bench, and, anyway, I didn't say he was innocent, I said he hasn't been proven guilty."

Mark grinned lopsidedly. "That's not what _I _heard. Besides, I doubt that there's anybody else in LA County who's even willing to go that far in giving him the benefit of the doubt."

"It's gonna be tough, then." Hardcastle picked up his coffee cup and leaned back against the counter. "We've got to put together a jury of his peers who aren't already in a hanging mood."

00000

Mark was finally persuaded to head off to class. This was a good thing, because an hour later the 405 was reportedly at a standstill. The midday TV news programs were heavy on the visuals. It wasn't oil or caltrops this time, but hastily unfolded banners—red paint on white sheets—hung from overpasses. The subject was revolution and the quotes were pithy, but not pithy enough to be entirely comprehensible unless the oncoming drivers at least tapped the brakes.

The end result was a series of gaper's blocks that eventually became self-perpetuating, even after the authorities had snagged the last of the displays and bundled them all off to the forensic lab. Mark was an hour late getting home that afternoon.

"There was only one still up by the time I was sitting on the highway. 'The seed of revolution is repression.' Is that Marx?"

"Woodrow Wilson."

"Come _on_," Mark frowned. "How the heck did you know that?"

"It was on TV, a couple of 'em. 'Every generation needs a new revolution'—that was a nice touch: Thomas Jefferson. But nobody's taken credit yet, and I don't think Tom was up late last night with a can of red paint and some cast-off sheets from Monticello."

"It's them, though, isn't it? I remember reading about the overpass trick in Loki's manifesto."

"Yeah, but he's the one guy we know for sure _didn't_ do it—him and Tom Jefferson. And it could have been anybody who's read that paper of his."

"Well, it wasn't _me_," Mark smiled. "I was in the second row of Twiggins' class and I've got the notes to prove it." His smile drifted down slightly. "It's them," he added in a more serious tone. "And it all seems pretty low-key—well, not the fire. But the rest of it is petty stuff, nuisances."

Hardcastle nodded. "Skirmishes, feeling out the enemy, looking for points of weakness. But so far it's an undeclared war."

There was no time for more than a sigh from the older man before the phone rang. Again Hardcastle's end of the conversation was mostly monosyllables, though some of these were uttered with more surprise than Mark had heard that morning.

It was a relatively short conversation, and after he hung up the phone the judge sat back in his chair, looking pensive.

"He's dismissed his lawyer and given notice that he'll be representing himself _pro se_."

Mark felt a shudder of familiarity at these unexpected words, with a sudden recollection of Weed Randall at the defendant's table accompanied only by what ought to have been a book of law.

But Hardcastle seemed to pay him no notice. His expression was more bemused than grim. "It gets better," he said. "He's also requesting a bench trial."

McCormick looked up sharply and couldn't help uttering an anxious "_No_."

"Yup, 'at the soonest convenience of the court'. His words in a letter he sent to the Presiding Judge—it arrived this morning." The judge shrugged casually. "Not what I would have expected, but he's entitled . . . sure can't accuse him of grandstanding."

"Not the usual way, maybe," Mark said angrily, "but look at it—he's got no one to rein him in, and all the stage time he could want. On top of which, with no jury _you're_ the bad guy, pure and simple. It's just a matter of time before the crazies go after you, now."

Another shrug. "Like I said, there'll be security."

Almost on cue, a car pulled up outside. Mark had slipped over to the window at the first sound of an engine, then subsided a little at the sight of a black and white police cruiser. Its occupant was familiar by face, part of Harper's handpicked crew. The officer stepped out on the driver's side, took a long, slow look around, then turned toward the house, shaded his eyes for a moment, and waved in the direction of the den window. Mark waved back and resumed his seat.

"See?" Hardcastle said placidly.

"When is the trial starting?" Mark asked, still grim.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three--A Clerk With a Good Right Hook  
**

In an almost blinding display of efficiency—unencumbered by any pretrial motions from the defense and abetted by the otherwise vacant schedule of the judge _pro tempore_ for the case—the opening statements were scheduled for the following Monday. That Sunday night found Mark ensconced in one of the den's wing chairs, with his nose down in a case book, studiously ignoring _The Comancheros _ It was Hardcastle who budged first. A few scenes before the movie's conclusion he rose and stretched.

"Got a schedule to keep tomorrow," he said, closing his mouth on a yawn. "Guess I'd better turn in."

Mark cocked his wrist and glanced down at his watch, then capped his pen and closed his notebook. "Yeah," he stacked everything on the table next to him, "what time do you want to leave in the morning?"

Hardcastle squinted at him and then said, pointedly, "Before you, I imagine."

"Well, that'd be silly, taking separate cars," Mark observed, keeping his tone very casual.

"You've got classes," the judge said firmly.

"No, I don't." The younger man carefully avoided smiling. That might have been pushing his luck and, besides, this hardly felt like something to smile about. But Hardcastle was looking increasingly disgruntled, so he forged on.

"Special dispensation. I went to the dean last Thursday. Anyway, Twiggins and Moro agreed—a week clerking for a real live Superior Court justice was a valuable learning experience, especially since I promised to brief all the cases they're covering while I'm gone and hand in my outlines next Monday." He frowned. "You don't think it'll take more than five days, do you?"

The question momentarily deflected the judge's ire. "Five days? Hell, after sixteen years the witness list is a little thin. And the word is that Loki hasn't been asking for any subpoenas to be issued to witnesses for his side of the story. The whole thing might be over in three."

Mark couldn't decide between worry and relief. The struggle must have been playing out on his face, though he turned and strolled to the front window. A squad car was still parked out there, its occupant continuing his lonely vigil.

"'Clerk'," Hardcastle grunted, "more like self-appointed body-guard. I think you're taking this whole thing too seriously."

"_Somebody_ has to," Mark said with a sudden and surprising fierceness. Then, just as quickly, he got a grip on himself. Lowering his chin and shaking his head, he drove his hands deep into his pants pockets. "I dunno. They say people are always preparing to fight the last war, but I can't help it; it's too much like the other time."

He lifted his head, staring out into the shadowy recesses of the yard. "I remember that night—the one before the Randall trial. All that crazy stuff had been going on and when I finally laid down I couldn't sleep, but what I was thinking about was how happy you'd looked when you got that _pro tem_ appointment, like it had been the best birthday present ever." He glanced over his shoulder at the older man, then back down at his own feet. "This might sound a little nuts, but all I could think about was that—how glad you were to be going back to it. Maybe I was even hoping it wouldn't be quite as good as you remembered."

"You thought I was going to bail on you, huh?"

"Maybe." Mark lifted his shoulders slightly and then let them settle again. "Yeah, something like that." He shook his head again. "What a stupid thing to be worried about."

"Hell, no," Hardcastle said practically, "everybody worries about change, and what'll happen to them if things _do_ change. It's only natural."

"Now, though, looking back, it seems pretty silly." He was staring out the window again. "And you never know what might happen next."

He shook free from the shadowy specter of the unknown and turned on his heel abruptly. "I'm going with you tomorrow."

He strode back to the chair, scooped his books off the end table, and was headed up the steps and into the hallway before the judge could enter an objection.

00000

The temporary courthouse annex was a thing of the past, at least partly on account of a notorious security lapse that had resulted in serious injury to a well-known jurist. Even in the third-floor, permanent courtroom, though, Mark kept a wary eye on those who were coming and going.

He'd left Hardcastle in his newly-assigned chambers, hoping that the sheriff's deputy in the hallway was adequate to the task of keeping that side-corridor clear. He was more interested in the public area. He'd reread Loki's papers one last time the night before, and into the early hours of the morning when he couldn't sleep. High profile incidents were the Red Fist's stock-in-trade.

He was on his feet, along the wall closest to the defendant's table, waiting for the man's arrival. It wasn't long. He entered well before the appointed hour, in wrist and waist shackles as befitted a former escapee. He wore a prison-orange jumpsuit: either ill-prepared, resigned to his fate, or trying to make a point about his status in an oppressive society.

From his face, Mark would have guessed the middle choice. Arthur Loki had the lean, weary look of a man who has spent years in suspense and was now more than half-glad it was nearly over. He allowed himself to be escorted to his seat. There was no insistence on removing the hardware and no books or other paperwork in his possession. Mark knew better than to think of him as utterly harmless, but sitting there, by himself, he did not look very dangerous.

But was he really alone? Mark turned to watch the rest of the courtroom, which wasn't even half-full. A couple of the attendees he recognized. They were members of the press. He didn't know if any of this was an inkling, on their part, that the Red Fist was in resurgence. He thought if that were so, the attendance would have been better still. The current attitude seemed more perfunctory, along with a certain element of "Why are we bothering?"

Briston and another deputy DA had arrived, and were occupying their seats at the prosecution's table. The court reporter had taken her place by the bench and set up her equipment. The bailiff returned.

It was time, Mark realized, and he steeled himself for the disturbing sense of déjà vu.

"All rise for the Honorable Milton C. Hardcastle."

He was already on his feet and only wished he could get through this next part sitting down. The rest of the courtroom shuffled and stood, Loki right along with them with no visible threat in his demeanor.

Hardcastle looked absolutely at home in his old judicial robes. He was barely seated when he cast an obvious, surveying look at the accused. He frowned and then said, "Unless that's some kind of political statement you're making, I think we can do without the bracelets."

Loki appeared momentarily startled, then glanced down at his shackles. When he'd lifted his head again, it was only to shake his head, briefly and without further comment. Hardcastle signaled his bailiff, who produced a key and approached the prisoner.

With that bit of business done, and Loki left rubbing his wrist in bemusement, the charges were read. Felony murder was not among them. The DA must've decided to go for the surer things. If Loki was relieved, it was not possible to tell from the three-quarter rear view Mark had. His plea of not-guilty was entered. Briston was rising to make his opening statement when Mark saw the judge wave him down with a hand.

"I think since these proceedings have been in abeyance for sixteen years now, we can hold up for a few more minutes."

Briston looked nonplussed and glanced over at Loki, as though he had somehow caused the problem. Mark figured this was obviously a safer bet than trying to stare down Hardcase. But there wasn't time for much of a stare before the judge was getting to his feet again, as he rumbled on, "I'd like to see both parties in chambers."

There was a murmuring from the small audience. Briston froze for a moment. Loki cocked his head, and then turned toward the bailiff as if seeking permission to stand. Mark was already halfway to the low railing separating the tables from the observer's area. The bailiff turned his attention from the prisoner to him.

"_Amicus curiae_," Mark said with a nervous smile.

"My clerk," Hardcastle tossed back over his shoulder. "Let him through."

Briston bent slightly, conferring in whispered tones with his colleague. Then he straightened and followed Hardcastle toward the door that lead back to his chambers. The bailiff herded Loki along, with Mark following close behind.

They all mustered, in fairly good order, in the anonymous office just down the hallway from the courtroom. The bailiff had Loki's handcuffs out and available.

Hardcastle raised one eyebrow and then shook his head no. "Leave him be." To the defendant he said, "It's not so much that I trust you, it's just that the one thing I insist on in my clerks is a good right hook."

Loki looked nervously over his shoulder. McCormick, leaning casually against the wall near the door, tried to exude an aura of menace.

With the bad cop established, Hardcastle gestured prosecutor and defendant to chairs and took his own seat behind a walnut desk. There were no distractions, not so much as a piece of paper. The judge knit his fingers together and rested his hands squarely on the desk, leaning forward slightly.

"Lots of people like to quote Gladstone—'Justice delayed is justice denied', but I like something Cicero said—'The foundation of justice is good faith'."

The judge had been doing most of his leaning in Loki's direction. He eased back a little and considered the man sitting quietly before him.

"I've presided over a lot of trials in my time, and I'd like to think, by now, that I can tell when someone is trying to throw a fight." He paused briefly and, getting no response from the man, he said, "You've got no legal training that I'm aware of, and you don't seem to be putting together any kind of defense. I suppose that's understandable, if there's no defense to be had, but I have to warn you, that man on your right—" he nodded quickly at Briston "—is gonna kick your butt, even though he hasn't tracked down many witnesses."

Briston sat forward in his seat abruptly as if he intended to lodge an objection. "_But_—"

"We're _in camera_, counselor, save it for the trial," Hardcastle cut him off gruffly and then turned back to Loki impatiently. "So you want to tell me what's going on here? You being threatened by someone, or have you decided to be a martyr for the cause—which is it?"

Loki swallowed once and cast a long look at Briston, then dragged his gaze back to Hardcastle, licking his lips nervously.

"It's not like you're going to believe me, anyway."

"Try me."

The man lifted both hands up and dropped them both back into his lap, before Mark could even register it as the threat it was not.

"It's like something out of Kafka," Loki said quietly. He sat there, motionless for a moment, not elaborating.

"Start at the beginning," Hardcastle prodded, when it had become obvious that Loki needed more encouragement.

"The beginning?" the man shook his head bemusedly. "That'd be the spring of '66. I was on my way to a meeting in the History department. I was defending my Master's thesis." He frowned. "Traffic was bad and I was running late. I would have made it, though, except I ran a stop sign on the east side of campus. A cop saw me—pulled me over. I _told_ him why I was in a hurry and, I swear, he went even slower—ran a check on me and everything. I was steaming, but I kept my composure.

"I was ten minutes late for the meeting. The senior member of the committee gave me a dressing down. 'Disrespect—the plague of modern youth', all that. I still scraped my thesis out of the fire, but it was an uphill battle and my chances of getting a fellowship dropped like a stone." Loki stopped and sighed. He gave Hardcastle a sheepish stare and said, "Are you sure you want to hear all of this?"

"Is any of it relevant?" the judge asked.

The man nodded. "Yeah, because I was still hopping mad when I came out of there and found a parking ticket on my windshield. I'd put the car too close to a fire hydrant." He smiled, still sheepish. "Believe it or not, up till that day I'd never had so much as citation for jaywalking. Other people were starting to dabble in politics, not me. But that night I went home and wrote it."

"The manifesto?"

Loki nodded. "I was angry. I'd just finished hammering out a ninety-five page paper on external forces and the decline of the Puritan ideal in seventeenth century Plymouth; what was another thirty pages of screed? It was . . . _satisfying_."

"Did you believe any of it?"

Loki's expression went flat, maybe slightly evasive. "No . . . well, maybe, while I was angry. Either way, I finished scribbling it out, signed it with all the flourish of John Hancock, and put the whole thing aside, in the bottom of a file drawer. Eventually I forgot about it . . . and I paid the fines, both of them."

He frowned. "I wasn't an angry person usually. I think maybe it all piled up on me that day. All those years of not being angry." He sighed. "Anyway, there it sat, in that drawer. I ought to have thrown it out. Maybe it embarrassed me some to realize I was just as subject to anger as everyone else."

There was silence again. Loki seemed lost in thought. Briston appear increasingly impatient. Hardcasatle finally cleared his throat. "So, what finally changed your mind and made you take it out again?"

The man lifted his head suddenly, as though he'd been startled from deeper thought.

"Uh?" His brows knit again. "Well, I got my Masters, see? It was time to move on—the peripatetic life of a journeyman scholar. And I settled at the university. You know that part." This was accompanied by a side nod to Briston. "So, I was going into the student union one afternoon a couple days later. Start of term, all the student organizations with their recruitment tables set up in the hallway outside the cafeteria. It was like running a gauntlet. This is going to sound stupid." He sighed. "I saw a girl—a young woman—at one of the tables." He pinched the bridge of his nose. "They didn't call themselves 'The Red Fist' back then. That came later. All I saw was this girl."

Mark could see he wanted to say something else, give some reason for having been smitten, some _rational_ explanation, but there's never anything rational about those things. Loki leaned back, looking at them all as if there was not much hope for someone else to understand what he couldn't himself fathom.

"A cup of coffee and some talk—mostly her doing the talking—that's how it started. She was willing, and we wound up back at my apartment. I was just moving in, boxes everywhere, and that's when she found it, lying there with a bunch of other stuff. I think I might have been meaning to throw it out." He let out a heavy sigh. "You should have seen the look on her face when she picked it up and started reading it—the light in her eyes."

"That was Eva Ostermann?" Briston asked.

"Evie, yes." Loki nodded. "She borrowed the paper. How was I to say no? She suddenly thought I was somebody special. I wasn't used to that."

"So you were just pretending to be an anarchist." Briston said harshly.

"Not even that, not for long. Well, okay, at first it was fun. Here I was, a graduate student—and she thought what I had written was better than Mao's book. More _practical_. She said it ought to be published. I told her no—good heavens. I would have been thrown out of the doctoral program. Of course I didn't say that. Just 'no'. But I let her take it.

"We saw each other quite a bit for a few months, then I got busy and distracted, and she seemed pretty busy, too. I didn't know with what until the first of the Red Fist incidents. I recognized it, of course. It was right off of page three. I found her. I was incensed."

"But you didn't go to the authorities?" Hardcastle asked.

"No, I couldn't. They made that clear right from the start."

"They?"

"Evie had shown the paper to Pete Solanger." For the first time since he'd started speaking, there was a glint of anger in Loki's eye. The tension was transmitted to his voice.

"Pete," Loki spat the name out harshly, "was always an opportunist. I didn't even meet him until after the first of the Red Fist operations, but by then he had possession of the document. He made it clear at the outset; if I did or said anything he would make sure my department head got a copy."

Loki shook his head slowly. "That's all I was worried about, then. This was '68. Us and them. I would have lost my TA job, my stipend, maybe even gotten kicked out of the program. I wasn't even thinking about criminal charges."

"You ought to have," Briston observed dryly. "And, anyway, there's plenty of collateral evidence that you spent time with and rendered assistance to Solanger and his cadre. In fact, you were considered to be the de facto director of the group's actions."

"I was," Loki sighed again, "a useful figurehead. I was a handy lightning rod, at any rate. Pete was calling all the shots."

Hardcastle gave him a hard stare. "And you're going to prove this?"

"I doubt it." Loki's eyes drifted to Briston. "He's on your witness list?"

It was Briston's turn to look evasive. "This is a matter for the court—"

"You found an address to serve the subpoena at?" Hardcastle interrupted.

Briston shook his head. "Both Solanger and Ms. Ostermann completed their terms of incarceration and parole over five years ago. Neither was under any obligation to remain in contact with the parole office." He hesitated, then plunged ahead. "We plan to present some of the evidence used in the earlier trials."

"I think the man had a right to confront the witnesses against him," Hardcastle said coolly. "I think you need to try a little harder." He glanced up at the clock. "I intend to go back out there and call for a recess of these proceeding until such time as the prosecution has exercised more thoroughness in its duty to locate these people—"

"_No_," Loki interjected. He'd leaned forward suddenly and now, with the room's undivided attention, and an obvious scowl on Hardcastle's face, he edged back again.

"The recess," he said hesitantly, "it's a bad idea, Your Honor."

"They're your case, it seems to me."

"Yes, well, _maybe_. I don't see how I can prove it. Pete—never. Maybe Evie. Who knows." He shook his head. "But that's not the issue. You see what's happening here, don't you?"

Hardcastle expression said no.

"Peter got out eight years ago, right? The Red Fist had fallen apart while he was behind bars. Now this, me being brought back to face trial, this is his opportunity. A chance to put his organization back together again. Publicity, recruits. All he needs is some evidence from you that what he's done so far has been effective. You call a recess and he's going to issue a public statement. Power to the people; down with tyranny, and all that. Then he'll turn the page and start in with more actions, all the while saying I'm a political prisoner. By the time Pete's done, I'll be a pariah. Why the hell do you think I asked for a bench trial at the earliest possible date?" Loki pulled up short, looking breathless in his anxiety.

"Two days," Hardcastle said firmly. "And I suggest you get yourself a lawyer. I like everybody at the table to know the rules of the game. Makes things run smoother." The judge was on his feet.

Loki looked desperate. "No lawyer."

"Your funeral," Hardcastle said, shaking his head. And then, "I'll send my clerk over to Central—you'll see him? Just to get some more details—might help us running down your witnesses. The sooner we find 'em, the sooner we can get this trial back on the tracks, right?"

Loki looked over at the guy with the good right hook and nodded glumly, hauling himself up to his feet.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four—A Dead Lydia**

"I took a class on it," Mark said archly, poking at the remains of his lunch, "that's not how a trial's supposed to start."

"Yeah, well, would you have rather had it go like Weed Randall's?"

Mark paled slightly and muttered, "It's not funny."

"Well, I'm just sayin' I would've thought you'd be happy, me trying to get things a little more _organized_ before we get underway."

"You're investigating—that's what it is. Admit it."

Hardcastle put his napkin down and looked at his watch. "You can drop me off at the station and then head over to Bauchet Street; they should have him checked back in by then."

"You believe all that stuff he was handing out this morning?"

"I believe Loki hasn't been in communication with any members of the Red Fist, including Pete Solanger, since he was arrested up in Oregon. I believe his actions since that arrest suggest he wants no part of that organization, even if those actions detract from his defense. I think all that bears some looking at."

"Okay, I'll go take some notes," Mark put his own napkin on the table. "But what are you and Frank going to be up to?"

"Research."

00000

Mark made his way into the labyrinth of Men's Central with no small reluctance. It was one of his least favorite places, fraught with unpleasant associations and memories. Just walking through the main doors tightened the muscles at the base of his neck and sent his eyes darting suspiciously. He wasn't sure if Hardcastle would have understood.

On this occasion, though, there was the novelty of being sent on a solo errand, with phone calls having apparently preceded him. A Superior Court Justice's clerk, on official business of the court—it had a nice ring to it that made up in a small way for the smells and sounds of the jail.

In his official status he apparently rated an interview room and the prompt retrieval of the high-profile defendant. Loki was back in shackles, even for this quick transport inside the building. Mark didn't try to pull a Hardcastle; he let them be.

Loki sat, glumly accepting of the indignity. He didn't seem particularly receptive to further interviewing and Mark didn't have a clear notion of where to start. He finally settled for the commonplace: things that could be verified elsewhere, to some degree, as a means of gauging Loki's attitude and degree of cooperation. There might even have been an element of personal curiosity when he asked, "How'd you do it?"

"Do what?" Loki's expression remained flat.

"Get away. Hide out all those years."

"Oh . . ." the man frowned, as though it was all lost in the misty past. He finally shrugged and said, "I suppose it doesn't matter now." He cocked one eyebrow, considering the younger man across the table. "Those were strange times. There really was a counter culture. Nobody knew who I was and everybody knew. It was weird. I got to a commune, up north . . . I don't think I should tell you who helped me."

It was Mark's turn to shrug.

"I stayed there a while. At first every time I'd hear a car go by out on the road my heart would speed up, you know?"

Mark nodded.

"But eventually I stopped being terrified. I settled down. It was dull. I wasn't cut out for farming, and smoking pot made me wheeze . . . I missed the university." He smiled ruefully. "And, anyway, the folks there were of two minds about me. I guess you could say I was on trial up there, too, and the jury was divided. Eventually it just seemed better to move on. One of the commune leaders—I won't tell you his name—he'd given a lot of advice to draft dodgers. He told me to head into Eugene, do some research in the old papers, find a kid, someone who had died young, and get a copy of the birth certificate."

Mark nodded again; he'd heard stuff like this in prison. "You had to build a new identity from scratch."

"Exactly. So that's what I did. Went through a year's worth of papers from around the same time I'd been born. Found a child—Timothy Pickens—seemed like a common name. I got the certificate, got some other ID using that, even had some school papers forged for a Catholic grade school that had since closed. I _became_ Tim Pickens. Worked odd jobs, made enough to get along. But it was tough, see? Arthur would creep back out at the oddest times, make an observation, get some weird looks from the guys on the loading dock."

"You had to watch yourself."

"Yeah. I needed a better cover. I went for a G.E.D. and then applied to a community college—got the associate's degree in library science. That part was all real. I went to a small town up there, got an entry-level position in a town library.

"I thought I'd be okay. I kept my distance; that's just how Tim was." He smiled sadly. "Tim the librarian."

"How'd you finally slip up?"

"Oh, well, a fluke, really. I was at the desk, a woman came up. She was new in town and wanted to apply for a card. She was about my age but had a cane and walked with a limp. I handed her the form. She kept looking at me oddly, but by then most of the paranoia was gone. I was pretty calm. She started filling out the paper, but her eyes kept coming back to me, to my name tag, really. I looked down and saw what she'd written on the application: Eleanor Pickens."

"She—"

"Was Tim's sister. He'd died in a car crash, his mother along with him. Eleanor had survived. I knew I'd been taking a chance, but what were the odds?" He shook his head. "Like a Greek tragedy, me meeting up with her. She'd noticed it right off. She even mentioned that she'd had a brother by the same name. She wondered out loud if we were related."

"So she suspected something was wrong?"

"No, not right away or, well, maybe . . . but she didn't say anything. I thought I'd stayed pretty cool, but once I'd gotten out of there, I was in a blind panic. It was a small town and I didn't really have any friends. When you're in hiding you can't afford friends. Anyway, I didn't know who she was talking to, what she might have said."

He looked up sharply. "I don't suppose a guy like you would understand any of this."

Mark twitched in momentary startlement at the harshness of the comment. He'd actually been lost in the consideration of how close he'd come, once or twice, to going on the run.

"No," he said, a peaceable law clerk who'd never had any such moments of moral ambivalence, "it's all pretty strange."

"Yeah," Loki sighed. "And it was stupid of me, really, if I hadn't gotten so damn twitchy, probably nothing would have happened. But there was no way to avoid the woman . . . such a small town, and eventually she must've gotten suspicious. She asked around—must've realized that nobody knew anything about me, really, and she finally talked to the sheriff."

"They can't arrest you for being an outsider," Mark observed quietly.

"Nah, but if they're bored enough they can come up with some pretext for running you in. Failure to stop for a school bus in my case, and a busted tail light—which one of the neighbor kids must've done. I got finger-printed, and that was that."

_Good police work_, Mark thought, but kept that to himself.

"Bad luck," he said.

"Karmic destiny, if you ask me," Loki said wryly. "I stole that kid's identity. That was the worst thing I've ever done. You know I visited his grave once, up by Eugene, back at the beginning. I tried to make it right with him. I guess Timothy wasn't buying—siccing his sister on me like that."

"Small world," Mark said.

"_Dangerous_ world," Loki replied intensely. "So," he added, after a moment, "now you know how I screwed up. What else does Judge Hardcastle want from me? I'm not going to name any names from when I was on the lam."

"Nah," Mark shook his head. "what he's interested in is your old cadre—The Red Fist."

"I can't help you there. I haven't talked to any of them since the day I went on the run. Not then, and not since they've been out. I thought about it a few times . . . Evie . . . but, _no_—no contact."

"How well did you know Solanger?"

"Not well. We didn't like each other."

"And Eve Ostermann?"

"I thought I knew her."

"Any idea where she might have gone after her parole was up?"

"Her dad was dead. Her mom lived down in Palos Verde. Evie wasn't exactly a member of the proletariat."

"Her mother died while she was in prison."

"Oh." Loki frowned. "Bad. They were pretty close, I think." He sighed again. "No brothers or sisters that she ever mentioned. If her mom passed, then Evie might be set up . . . the inheritance."

"And you don't know anything about Solanger."

The man was still frowning. "An only child, too, I'm pretty sure. He grew up in Bakersfield, I think he said. I don't think he would have left LA. He said he hated small towns. Now _he_ was a prole—dad was a truck driver. Pete was a scholarship kid. Hated all the rich frat boys. Didn't like what he called 'book-smart' people very much, either. He was good at rousing the rabble, though." He squinted for a moment and asked, "Is any of this helping?"

Mark looked down at his sparse scribbling of notes. "Names?" he asked. "Addresses?"

Loki shrugged. "It's been a long time . . . this is all pretty hopeless, huh?" His tone of resignation conveyed his own opinion on the matter.

Mark leaned back, studying him. "It's never hopeless until everyone's given up. If you really think you ought to do a dime for stealing that kid's name, then I suppose things are pretty grim, but that still won't keep Hardcastle from poking his nose into it."

"I kinda wish I'd stuck around for the trial," Loki said ruefully. "Mighta been interesting."

Mark smiled, got up from his seat, and tapped the door. He watched Loki erase all emotion from his face, already an experienced denizen of the system from his previous stay in jail. A guard appeared to escort the man out and, as always in this situation, Mark felt a strange momentary disconnect, as though he weren't free to turn the other way down the hall and depart. He wondered how many more times it would be—how many errands he'd have to run to this place, before his heart would stop beating faster at the sound of the guard's footsteps in the hall.

00000**  
**

Frank Harper didn't seem to mind having Hardcastle underfoot in his office. He apparently shared Mark's grim view of the risks the judge was running and an afternoon spent at a police station was one less during which he could be assassinated. Unfortunately, the pickings were thin in the computer files on the other Red Fist defendants—no current addresses, and only hints as to where they'd departed to once they'd finished their commitment to the system.

The judge had mined what he could from the system, and was deep in discussion with Frank on what means they might use to expand on what they had, when Mark strolled in.

Hardcastle glanced down at his watch, realizing they'd been at longer than he'd thought. "How's traffic?"

Mark shrugged and grabbed a chair. "Nothing suspicious. It's kinda hard to tell in LA where normal leaves off and the conspiracy starts."

Harper was nodding to that. The judge frowned. "You get anything good?"

"Probably not what you wanted." Mark pulled the notebook out of his jacket pocket and flipped it open. "Eve Ostermann was the sole beneficiary of the estate of Rose, her mother, about ten years ago. There was property, which was sold. The house by itself brought in a little over a million dollars. Jake Solanger, Pete's dad, quit the long-haul trucking trade a few years back—health problems. He collects his pension at a retirement home in Alhambra."

Mark flipped the notebook closed. "That's it," he said abruptly. "Loki didn't even know Rose and Jake's first names. I stopped by the Hall of Records on my way over."

Hardcastle cast a glance at Frank, along with a tight smile of satisfaction. "They didn't teach him _that_ in law school."

Frank, on the verge of a reply, was diverted when his phone rang. He'd barely said hello before the expression on his face focused the other two men's attention. From his end the conversation was terse and brief and ended with "We'll be there."

"What?" Hardcastle asked almost before the receiver was back in the cradle.

"Your place. A fire and . . . some other damage."

00000

Mark led the way on the drive north, quietly cussing what appeared to be normal rush-hour traffic. Hardcastle kept quiet most of the trip. Frank, behind them in his sedan, hadn't been able to provide many specifics, but as they pulled into the drive, the judge was relieved to see the main house still standing, looking reasonably unscathed.

The sole black and white that had been parked in the drive that morning had been augmented by an investigator's car from the fire marshal and the engine company's rig, now packing up its hoses and preparing to depart. The cop was the first one over to them, looking apologetic and mostly addressing Frank.

"I smelled smoke and it seemed to be coming from over by the front of the property. The wind was blowing from that direction. It fit the M.O. of the other incident. I radioed it in and headed over there to see what was up."

He paused, looking worried about the reception his story might receive, but both Frank and the judge were listening without apparent emotion. Only Mark seemed edgy, stepping away from the others and raking his gaze over the houses and grounds.

The officer ducked his chin and then lifted his head again, forging on. "I couldn't see how bad it was--lots of smoke. The arson guys are still looking at it, but they think it was accelerants and shredded rubber—some bushes caught, but not all that much damage to the trees."

"And the rest?" Frank asked grimly.

The officer shifted from foot to foot briefly and then stepped back, gesturing the others toward the north side of the house. The hedge was still standing intact, shielding that part of the yard from view, but as they approached it, Mark could see the first signs of vandalism.

"An axe, Something heavy and sharp," the officer said, still with the detached tone of someone filing a report. Harper sucked an audible breath in through his teeth.

Mark took two steps forward and started to reach down for one of the half-uprooted, shattered rose plants.

"Crime scene," Hardcastle touched his sleeve, halting him, "might be shoeprints."

Mark froze, then nodded, backing off slightly while still taking in the extent of the damage.

"Just roses," the judge pointed out.

"But some of them were—"

"Roses, that's all." Hardcastle turned away. The splatter of red paint on the back wall of the house still glistened in spots, though the thinner parts were already drying. There's been no attempt to shape the message into words. Everything but destructive intent was left to the imagination. "It could have been worse. No one was hurt."

"The Lydia," Mark said. He'd wandered along the perimeter of the decimated rose garden, toward the low section in the back where the plant in question lay trodden into the dirt.

Hardcastle wasn't trying to warn him away from the mangled evidence anymore. "We'll get another," he said firmly, "but not until this is over," he added with even grimmer resolution.

Mark looked up, discontented, but then turned abruptly on his heel and returned to the group.

"I'll have the guys come out," Frank said. He was looking up at the sun, only a couple hours from setting. "Probably tomorrow before we can get much from it."

Hardcastle nodded and took the lead heading toward the kitchen steps. The officer peeled off, seeming eager to return to his guard duty. Mark lingered for a moment, studying the damage one last time. He finally shook his head, lips thin and tight as he followed the other two inside.

They retreated to the den, with Frank laying claim to the phone for a series of short calls. Hardcastle had taken a seat and looked as though he were meditating on a deep problem. Mark was still on his feet, staring out the side window into the lengthening shadows on the lawn.

Frank had barely hung up before the judge grunted and said, "The fire, the paint, all those bushes done before the extra cops got here—we're talking at least four people, maybe more—"

"This is nuts," Mark interjected, turning away from the view. "They know who you are, where you live. We're still trying to guess how many of them there are—and you haven't even gotten to the opening arguments of the trial." He shook his head.

"I'm asking for an extra man out here," Frank said. "Unless maybe you'd consider relocating to someplace where it'd be a little easier to protect you."

Hardcastle said nothing, but his look of resolve was unmistakable.

Mark sighed. "'Course he won't. This is the Alamo, Frank. Reasonable compromise is not in the dictionary here."

"The guy in the nursing home," the judge started in, as if all other matters were closed to discussion, "Solanger's dad. That's where we need to start."

"I'll send a detective over there." Frank started to reach for the phone.

"No," Hardcastle said hastily. "Not a cop. He's not a suspect, dammit. I'd like to keep it friendly . . . so far nobody's gotten hurt, but it's only a matter of time—"

Mark's grunt of exasperation went uncommented on, except for a sharp glance from the judge.

"He's a dad," Hardcastle said with an air of calm reason. "If I can get him to see how dangerous this could become."

"Two fires, destruction to property . . . whoever's responsible isn't going to get off with a slap on the wrist," Frank pointed out.

"Just give me a chance."

00000

Frank departed, off to organize the official part of the investigation. The other two men remained in the den, though farther apart than might be thought possible in a room of that size. Mark still hadn't sat down. Hardcastle moved to the chair behind his desk, pulling the phone directory out of one of the drawers.

Mark listened to him make the call, verifying Jake Solanger's whereabouts but going no further than that.

"I figured an unannounced visit might be the best," the judge said after he hung up. "And I think the sooner the better."

"Finally something we can agree on," Mark said, pushing away from the wall he'd been leaning against and checking his watch. "We can pick up some burgers on the way over there."

"You feel safe riding around with the People's Enemy Number One?" Hardcastle jibed as he got to his feet.

The look he got from Mark was both immediate and sternly disapproving, but the words that followed were unexpectedly calm, almost reserved.

"I can't reason with you. I know that. But the least you ought to do for me is to take this seriously."

If Hardcastle had another wisecrack ready, he swallowed it whole. Instead, his expression went sober and his tone equally so. "Maybe I should've said it; I was thinking it this morning when I walked into that courtroom." He hesitated, as though the next part might be awkward for both of them, and then spoke flatly. "I was glad you were there . . . not that I thought anything was gonna happen, but— just in case."

Mark cocked his head, then shook it slightly. "Come on," he said, "let's go talk to the man."


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five—Two Clerks and a Couple of Clues**

Palm View Retirement Home had just enough palms in front to avoid an accusation of false advertising. It was an otherwise unprepossessing piece of utilitarian architecture—two floors, squat, and dominated by a cinder-block theme. Someone on the interior design crew must have thought green was a soothing color and gray wouldn't show the dirt.

Jake Solanger was staying on the second floor, room 258, and the desk clerk seemed surprised to see visitors arriving for him.

"End of the hall." She pointed in response to the judge's inquiry.

Mark pulled him aside at the small nook that passed for a visitor's lounge—two steel-framed, vinyl-upholstered chairs, both with cigarette burns in the seat covers.

"You go talk to him. I'll wait for you. Two of us will probably make him nervous."

Hardcastle nodded once, and then gave their surroundings a sweeping glance followed by a sad shake of his head. "Retirement isn't all it's cracked up to be."

Mark said nothing as he watched him trudge off down the hall, then turned back toward the desk where the clerk still sat, looking bored. The judge was barely out of sight before he sidled over toward her, leaning casually against the higher counter that fronted her work place.

The woman at the desk was perhaps forty, heavy-set and bottle-blond. She'd paid them no further attention since their brief first encounter. Now she looked up from what she was doing—a crossword from the TV section of the LA Times—as if puzzled to see him still standing there.

"I don't even know the guy." Mark shrugged.

"Oh." The clerk's eyes narrowed slightly as she glanced down the hall at Hardcastle, now giving the door a quick and perfunctory rap, but even this much suspicion seemed like too much effort. She gave a little shrug of her own.

"Yeah, I didn't think he had much family." She frowned, brow furrowed slightly. Then her gaze drifted back down to the magazine on the desk before her. "'Paladin meets Mr. Ed?'—the question mark, that means a double meaning, sort of. Eleven letters."

"_Knight Rider_," Mark said, without bothering to count it out. "The one with the talking car."

"Ohh." She smiled and pounced on the page with her pencil.

Mark nodded glumly but turned to lean both elbows on the counter. "So his son comes to visit a lot? Pete, I mean."

She didn't even look up this time, being on a roll. "Ah . . . yeah, I suppose you could say that. Mostly in the evenings." She finally glanced up. "Pete . . . you know him?"

"Just by name." Mark graced her with a smile, which she cautiously returned, then dropped her gaze to the page again.

"'Angela's vehicle', fourteen letters."

Mark thought for a moment, counted it out on his fingers, and then muttered, "_Murder, She Wrote_ . . . you don't watch much TV, huh?"

She shook her head as she penciled in the latest addition. "I usually work evenings. More visitors then," she wrinkled her nose slightly, "but not that many more. Don't get old." She sighed. "Mr. Solanger, he's okay. Comes out here to bum cigarettes sometimes. His son doesn't want him to smoke. But Jake's still pretty sharp." She tapped the side of her nose knowingly. "Never smokes in his room—hides the ashtray even—on days when his son visits."

Her smile blossomed. "Can't help it, I like the old guy. My dad was a trucker, too. Jake's got a million stories."

"I'll bet." Mark leaned his chin on his hand, extending the air of mutual confidences. "But he and Pete don't see eye-to-eye, huh?"

The clerk cocked her head slightly. "Well, sons and dads, you know."

"Uh-huh."

"But he visits, which is more than I can say for most of them—and he never cusses his dad out, nothing like that. He's pretty low-key. It's just that Jake's . . . well, he's _Jake._ Friday night it was about Pete getting a real job—you could hear it all the way down here. 'Get a rig. Stop hanging around with a bunch of deadbeats and get out of the slum.'" She shook her head. "It's too bad."

"But he keeps coming back, huh?" Mark observed quietly.

"Yeah, not like his daughter."

"Jake's?" Mark couldn't help it; he'd said it as doubtful surprise.

"Uh-huh. Just the one time, though." She paused in thought and then added, "That was Friday, too. She didn't even stay long."

"What'd she look like?" Mark asked, trying to sound casual.

"Oh," the clerk frowned, "mid-thirties and . . ." her description faltered at that. "Dark hair, I think," she added vaguely.

Mark nodded again. "I should probably let you get back to your work."

He straightened up and leaned back from the desk. She looked reluctant to see him go.

He glanced at the clock and headed down the hall, not intending to barge in if it sounded as if Hardcastle was making progress. He heard muffled voices, mostly the judge's, but before he could decide further, the door to Jake's room opened, with the judge's hand on the inside knob and his back visible in the widening space. He was obviously taking his leave with a formulaic, ". . . and if you think of anything else, or if he contacts you, you've got my card."

There as nothing but a nearly inaudible mutter from further within the room. The judge turned and stepped out, his dissatisfied look taking in Mark as he answered the younger man's unasked question with a grunt.

He said nothing more until they were past the clerk—who beamed and nodded at Mark—and into the stairwell.

"The guy's a bust," Hardcastle grumbled. "I think he may not be hittin' on all cylinders. But, anyway, he says he can't remember the last time he saw Pete."

"Two days ago," Mark said flatly. "Oh, and Jake had another visitor Friday evening—a woman with a maddeningly vague description, but she gave at least one member of the staff the impression she was Jake's long-lost daughter."

Hardcastle paused on the step and gave him a sharp sideward look and then cast another one over his shoulder, up the stairs. "Figures."

"What are clerks for?" Mark smiled and shrugged. "The question mark," he added archly, "denotes a double meaning."

"We can have Frank send a guy over here with some pictures, see if she tags Eve." Hardcastle barged the door open at the bottom of the stairs and added, "Better not make yourself so useful; I might want to keep you handy."

"Nope. Back to status quo once this is over: me hitting the books and you retired."

He realized a split-second later that the timing might have been awkward. The silence certainly was as they passed under the unwelcoming sign over the doorway.

"Anyway," Mark started up again doggedly, "Pete's dad is supposed to be a pretty sharp customer and Pete visits regularly—evenings, mostly. They don't see eye-to-eye on some stuff. Jake says he's hanging around with deadbeats.

"And his dad is covering for him." Hardcastle paused and half-turned again. "Think we can pry an address loose from the records here?"

Mark gave that some brief consideration and then said, "Not likely. He might be a little on the transient side."

"And we just missed a visit? _Damn._" The judge shook his head in disgust as he opened his side of the truck and climbed in. "Might be a while before we get another shot at him."

"Maybe not—did you notice an ashtray in Jake's room?"

Hardcastle hadn't, and it was quickly decided that tonight was as good a night as any to start the stake-out. His preference would have been to rustle up some dinner and head right back to the Palm View but, as Mark pointed out, he was a known entity to their quarry.

"Yeah but sixteen _years_," the judge protested.

"It's the perspective," Mark pointed out patiently. "From the defendant's table—it's permanent recall. You'll just have to trust me on that one." He checked his watch. "I can run you back to Frank's and you can get a lift home from there. The evidence guys must be done already. Somebody has to get a jump on the straightening up."

Hardcastle scowled and seemed on the verge of saying something about who was in charge and who was the spear-carrier on this operation, but everything Mark had just said made too much sense and he must have known it.

As for Mark, he knew once he handed the judge back into Frank's keeping there wouldn't be any solo shenanigans for the man, and that suited him fine. What he hadn't figured on was the reciprocation clause.

"And if he shows up, you drop a dime, y'hear?" Hardcastle said sternly. "No chasing off after him by yourself.

"Yeah," Mark nodded, "of course. First chance I get."

The judge's expression had gone suspicious. He sat up a little straighter in his seat and scanned their surroundings. "There," he pointed across the street—a free-standing public phone in front of a gas station, "from that one, as soon as you see him."

Mark nodded with just a hint of exasperation and put the truck in gear.

00000

An hour and a half later he was back, grateful that, for once, the Red Fist had taken the night off—possibly to visit an old folks' home. In any regard, there'd been only the typically bad LA traffic and his turn-around time had been within acceptable limits.

He took up his watch from the lot, a respectable distance from the entrance but fairly close in under the open window of Jake's room. He'd picked up a newspaper and bag of fast food, with which to look like a guy maybe waiting for his wife to finish visiting with her mom, and to have good justification for the frequent, slightly-impatient glances toward the door each time there was some movement over there.

Though he'd spent long enough looking at Solanger's mug shot—the not-too recent one provided from his retired parole file—he hadn't been entirely sure when the most likely candidate arrived, a little after seven, in a nondescript van of ancient vintage. That was his first excuse for not wasting a dime. He jotted down the plate number and sat back to await developments.

The confirmation came about ten minutes later—the rising sounds of an older man's voice drifting down from the window above. 'Conversation' wasn't quite the right word for it and it didn't drift for long, rapidly becoming louder and more pointed. He couldn't make out anything from Pete, though from snatches of Jake's end of the argument—_monologue _might have been the more accurate term—it was obvious that his son was on the receiving end.

Mark cast a quick glance back across the street. He'd _promised_. By now the judge would have a subpoena drawn up and everything. Of course that would be an exercise in futility if Solanger really was still plotting the revolution. In fact, it would only drive the man deeper into hiding.

But he'd promised, and he could hardly demand the Hardcastle show some restraint if he himself went off on an investigative bender. He sighed and started up the truck, intending to re-park it—close at hand—while he made the call.

That's what he did, right at the curb and pointing in the proper direction, just in case. He had the change in his hand and had fully intended to save time and energy by calling Frank directly. He got as far as lifting the first coin to drop it in when he saw the card stuck clumsily into the change slot: "Out of order."

He grimaced, hung the receiver up, and stepped back slightly. And that was when he saw him—Pete Solanger stepping out of the front doorway of the Palm View. He couldn't blame the guy. Jake had probably been short on nicotine that day and feeling the effects.

Solanger headed directly for his van, an off-white no-frills '73 Econoline. His hand was now stuffed into his pants pocket and undoubtedly fishing for his keys. From this distance he looked harmless, maybe a little dejected. Of course the van could be full of explosive devices, but, if so, he probably would have used one on the nursing home. Whatever he'd wanted from Jake had obviously not been forthcoming.

The van was already in gear and backing out of its space. Mark cast a quick look back at the only open business—the gas station itself. It was one of those all-night places with a security window and no public interior. By the time he could convince the evening attendant he needed a call made, Solanger and his singularly unmemorable vehicle would be just another license number on a watch list.

On the other hand—

Mark had the driver's side door to the truck open and swung himself into the seat with the efficiency of muscle memory. He actually had to wait a moment before pulling out, to avoid being directly behind his quarry.

The journey took them into the heart of the city and then out again, all going south, but fortunately nearly all but the first few blocks were on the 110, which meant for easy and anonymous tailing. There were no noticeable evasive maneuvers or anything that suggested to Mark that he'd been made, and by the time Solanger reached his exit, the cover of darkness concealed the distinctiveness of Hardcastle's truck.

Of course South Central might be a little short on working public phones, too, Mark figured, but nobody could say he hadn't _tried. _

He now stayed well back from the van, guided only by its taillights. Solanger didn't seem to be cruising aimlessly, and this wasn't a neighborhood that favored the unprepared. He made only a couple of turns before pulling to park on the curb in front of what appeared to be an abandoned storefront.

Mark parked as well, without crossing the last intersection and halfway between two street lights. He killed his lights before the driver's door on the van began to open, but left his engine idling.

It was no ruse. Solanger stepped down out of the van, went to the back and opened the door there. Mark wasn't sure what he expected to see inside—it was really too far and too dark to see much of anything. He'd already made note of the approximate address, and if the man went inside, he could call it a night and go find that elusive pay phone—or the nearest police station, more likely.

But curiosity kept him glued to the spot. He saw Solanger lifting a box out of the vehicle—moderately heavy by stance and movements. He was handling it with some care. Mark resisted the urge to move in closer, even if he had to do it on foot. For all he knew it was his father's laundry—no, he'd come out of the nursing home empty-handed.

In an instant, everything changed. From across the street, empty except for some light traffic, three lithe, quickly-moving figures emerged. Mark wasn't sure where they'd come from, so fixedly had his eyes been on Solanger. There were words; somebody had something in his hand. The box had fallen, now pulled back with its top ripped open. A little scuffling.

Mark had his door open. _You don't have a gun._ But he did have a tire iron—a far more viable tool in a street fight because he'd feel less retrained about using it—and, in his experience, an unexpected tire iron could usually take out a distracted gun. He moved in quickly, staying to the shadows, and was nearly in position when he saw yet another late entry into the fray.

This guy had it all over the first three in both height and breadth. He hadn't bothered with a tire iron, grabbing a wrist and doing something that was unpleasant enough to make the gun-holder yelp and drop the weapon. The other two had backed off; one turned and ran, and as quickly as things had come to a head, it was over. The big man gave the last of the miscreants a stiff shake by the neck of his sweat shirt. It wasn't clear if the kid—maybe fifteen—still had his feet on the ground.

There was some sort of nearly subsonic warning growled and then, like a pan fish from a catch-and-release pond, he tossed him back. The kid stumbled to his feet and bolted, gunless.

Mark was close enough now to be visible to both the remaining men. He let the tire iron drop to his side and shrugged, still holding it lightly. "Looked like you needed some help—guess not."

The bigger man laughed—a short guffaw with more rumbling undertones—then shook his head once and strode off. Solanger took a little longer to gather himself, straightening up slowly and brushing himself off. Mark stepped a little closer, scooping up the gun, giving it a quick glance, restoring the safety, and slipping into his jacket pocket—all with the bare minimum of handling. Only then did he take his first close look at his quarry.

He was pushing forty, but Mark already knew that from the record. His hair was shorter than it had been in his last photo, and he had the start of some gray, visible even by streetlight. He was wearing a t-shirt, also gray, and jeans with a few indeterminate splatters of what looked like dried paint on them. He was lean, but not particularly hardened, more gaunt.

He was stooping to pick up what had scattered from the box. It was groceries—loaves of bread, mostly, but under that had been cans of something.

"Good thing it wasn't the eggs," the man observed. It was surprisingly mild for the circumstances.

Mark nodded, reaching for the two items that had rolled the furthest and added them to the rest.

"You okay?" It might have been just a shadow, but there looked to be the start of a bruise below Solanger's right eye.

"Yeah," the man rotated his neck and shoulders, as if checking to see if he was right about that. "_Yeah_," he repeated with a little more conviction. "That was Winston, my neighbor. He says he doesn't, but I think he watches for me. He's supposed to be touched—you know, crazy—but I haven't worked up the nerve to ask him yet."

Solanger half-turned and gave him the once-over. "You were following me . . . why?"

It was all spoken with the same mildness as the earlier observations. Mark had a strange twinge of déjà vu and a half-second later it came to him—_Father Atia_.

"You're not a priest or something?" he blurted out.

"'Or something'," Solanger repeated solemnly, but there was just the beginning of a hint of a smile, "lay brother—Friends of the Poor."

_That_ hadn't been in the record. Mark squinted and tried to remember anything at all about the organization in question, but it wasn't the sort of thing Hardcastle kept files on, so instead he asked, "You live here?"

"Mostly," Solanger gave the storefront a look of undisguised pride, "while we fix it up. It's an intervention center—trying to give the younger ones an alternative to the gang life."

"You missed a couple," Mark observed dryly.

"Can't win 'em all," Solanger admitted. "And by the time they're that age it's a little late, though we never give up trying."

"I don't suppose you heard about what happened last week?"

Solanger stared at him with perfect blankness and finally shook his head. "Been busy. We're trying to get the fixing-up done by the end of the month. And the rest of the time I spend with my dad."

Mark winced.

"That was your truck at the Home?" Solanger observed. "I thought so. I've still got the reflexes, you know." He shook his head. "But you're good. I couldn't be sure until I got off the 110. Reporter," he asked warily, "or cop? I didn't think anybody was still interested." Then he frowned, as though he'd just remembered the original question. "And what happened last week?"

"Arthur Loki, extradited from Oregon."

The other man's face had gone blank again. He was good, _very _good—either that or honestly surprised. But if so, he was also unsettled by the news. He sat down heavily on the edge of the van's bed.

"Sixteen _years_, and they're still going after him?" Lay brother or not, there was an edge of anger under the purported disbelief.

"Mm-hmm." Mark nodded. "And there've been a few disruptions to the public order. Though I've got to admit, nothing that could hold a candle to what happened here a few minutes ago."

"So you're rounding up all the usual suspects?" Solanger said. The mildness was holding, but it seemed a little more studied.

"Actually, I'm not a cop—and not a reporter."

Solanger looked genuinely puzzled now.

"Can we go inside?" Mark asked simply.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six—A Friend of the Poor, with Paint**

Curiosity and uncertainty—or damn good facsimiles of both—got him through the door and into the front space of the former store. It was a still-life of chaos, with boards, cans of paint, drop cloths, and tools making for a circuitous route to the backroom where Solanger led him.

Despite the charitable nature of the endeavor, there were bars on the ground floor windows there. No air conditioning of course, but the windows were braced open. There was a refrigerator that had rounded-off corners and had seen several layers of paint, which it was now in the process of losing. The sink was utilitarian and all the stains, though present, were faded from repeated subjections to scrubbing. Along the other wall was a cot—wood frame, not aluminum, possibly World War vintage—which one was anybody's guess.

Solanger put the essentials in the fridge while Mark pulled a chair out from a table that was small enough to make this a tête-à-tête. The other man joined him a moment later, keeping his voice down though there was no one else on that floor.

"Eve?"

"Didn't send me. Do you have any idea where she is?"

It was hard to tell if that was disappointment or relief in the quick shake of Solanger's head.

"Then—"

"I work for Hardcastle—_Judge_ Hardcastle."

It looked fairly evident that the title had been unnecessary clarification, though man across the table from him managed to subdue any reaction besides surprise.

"_Why_?"

"They assigned the case to him, and he thought the defense's witness list was a little short. You know Loki's acting as his own counsel."

Solanger grimaced for a moment and then said, "Figures. He always was pretty full of himself." He glanced toward the ceiling for a split-second as if to ask forgiveness for the uncharitable thought. And then, all practicality again, "So you're here to bring me in?"

Mark shrugged. "I'm just a clerk. All I carry is a briefcase and a tire iron."

"And a subpoena."

"Left that at home. Oversight. I was just supposed to figure out where you were holed up."

"I'm not exactly 'holed up'," Solanger replied, but he didn't sound all that indignant when he added, "though it's a hole, I'll admit."

"Does all this friendly conversation mean you're willing to come in voluntarily? All parties are eager to get this underway. All we want from you is the truth."

He wisely left the details of that to the other man's imagination, not wanting to disturb his own increasingly easy acceptance Solanger as a person of good will, but all Pete said was, "Sixteen years, what's his hurry?"

"You really have been out of the loop, huh?" Mark didn't wait for an answer before plunging in. "The disruptions, remember?"

This time Solanger paled, as though he really had had time to think things through. If he wasn't honest, he was a superior kind of pathological liar, but Mark had met plenty of pros.

"Fires, vandalism, and letters to the mayor signed 'The Red Fist'. Seen any of your old cadre lately?"

"I've been _here_." He looked around himself slowly. "It's not just a place, you know. It's a purpose. There's a couple kids crashed upstairs—and this has been a slow week. One of 'em is fourteen, and he's already been in the system four times—once all the way up to Preston."

"Some people would say you have a built-in constituency here."

"A lot of people would say I have no right to be anywhere near a place like this, but believe me, we're a little short on volunteers. If I go and testify—even just one appearance—the heat will be on and I'll be forced out. Besides," Solanger added wearily, "you won't like what I'll say."

"Try us."

"I can't help the case against Artie. He was never really one of us. Evie roped him in and he was handy—looked good with those wire-rim glasses of his and knew how to write a polemic, that's all."

Mark leaned forward. "So you're saying he was coerced?"

Solanger chewed his lip for a moment and then finally responded. "Nobody really had to twist his arm. He was still after Evie. But once he was sure she wasn't buying, his level of commitment was pretty low. He tried to talk us out of setting off that last bomb."

"He doesn't remember it quite that way."

"Sixteen years is a long time to work on your defense. I only had about sixteen weeks—and then six more years to think about what I'd done." Solanger's tone had gone flat, to match his expression. "I heard about the guard—the one who died."

"You did?" Mark cocked his head. "What, an anonymous note?"

"No, Hardcastle signed it. It was very straight-forward. No threats, no recriminations. Just the facts. I suppose I was supposed to do with them as I saw fit."

"And—?"

"And here I am. You can tell him I got it."

"Why don't you come in and tell him yourself?"

"I told you, it won't help his case against Artie any, and it'll destroy what I have here."

Mark sat back again, with a slow nod of apparent acceptance.

"Might make my dad happy, though," Pete added with a sigh. "He's always on my case about getting a 'real' job—trucking, maybe. You should have just asked him where I was."

"Hardcastle did, this afternoon." Mark got to his feet, reclaiming his tire iron from where he'd propped it. "All your dad said was that he couldn't remember when he'd seen you last." He turned and headed for the front again.

Pete seemed to take a moment to find himself. Mark heard him stand and follow him, having said nothing.

"You'll be here?" Mark asked.

"Yeah, I will."

And the man was smiling slightly as he reached past him and opened the front door.

00000

It seemed pointless to look for a phone by then, so Mark merely merged onto the 110 and headed north. He was flagged through by the occupants of the squad car near the gate. His further greeting as he finally pulled in by the fountain, a little past eleven, was not unexpected.

"Where the hell have you _been_, McCormick?" Hardcastle growled from the front steps.

The judge didn't wait for the answer, though, having already turned and stomped back inside, presumably to issue an 'all clear' to Harper and the authorities. Mark felt a twinge of guilt—that aspect of it having entirely slipped his mind.

"The phone was out of order," he offered as he joined the older man in the den.

Hardcastle had been just hanging up his own receiver and turned back to him with a scowl. "_And_—?"

"And," Mark flopped down in the chair closest to the desk, "Pete Solanger wants you to know that he got your note in prison. It must've been a good one because he's had some kind of epiphany. He's running a storefront gang-prevention place down in South Central and has been so busy lately that he doesn't even read the newspapers."

This got a snort of disbelief from the older man.

"There were lots of pails of paint—brushes, too—at his location. I didn't notice if any of them were red. Juvenile delinquents are also in ready supply. 'Delinquents'—that's a quaint term, huh? Makes you think of the Sharks and the Jets and Officer Krupke—except this is the Crips and the Bloods, and I can't really see them stopping at mauling a few rose bushes."

"So you thought he's a fraud?"

Mark sighed and said, "Not while I was in the room with him. He's damn good if that's what it is. Anyway, he backs Loki's story, sort of."

He relayed the critical points, as verbatim as he could recollect them, and concluded with, "So, which does that make him—more or less likely to be up to his old tricks?"

"I'll have to get back to you on that one." Hardcastle frowned. "I already drew up the subpoena; we can—"

"He'd also like to point out to you that in his new line of work, his old line of work would be considered an insurmountable barrier, and the youth center will be out one manager once the press gets wind of this."

Hardcastle shut his mouth on his plans. His lips thinned under momentary pressure. He finally let out a single, quiet, "Damn."

"Any luck with the physical evidence?" Mark asked hopefully.

"Kinda early on that, don'tcha think?" the judge grumbled, obviously still pondering the other quandary. He finally reached up to rub the bridge of his nose. "Okay, look, at least we have an address for the subpoena, and we can keep an eye on this guy—I can have Frank check him out some more. We can maybe get him in to proffer, even, if we do it low-key, no statements to the press. If it looks like what he knows is critical though—"

"Or he's lying through his teeth—"

"Yeah, there's that, too." Hardcastle nodded sharply.

"Oh," Mark said, suddenly recollecting, "and there was this." He stood again long enough to gently extract the one piece of mostly-irrelevant physical evidence and put it on the judge's desk.

Hardcastle's eyebrows rose.

"He hasn't exactly got all the local youth with the program yet—three of them tried to rob him. And it wasn't me who liberated it—Solanger has a watchdog, a neighbor named Winston who's about the size of a house and laughs in the face of danger and deals with stuff like this bare-handed.

Hardcastle shook his head once in disbelief before leaned forward again, reaching for the phone and dialing. "Anyway, we've still got to find Eve Ostermann."

00000

Tuesday morning arrived clear and calm, with the paper containing only a paragraph or two—tucked far back in the local news—about the opening and near-immediate suspension of what was now being called "The Red Fist Trial".

Mark couldn't offer any opinions on the freeways. He was sitting in the den—papers and notes spread across sofa and coffee table—outlining cases.

The judge had suggested early on, that since all they seemed to be doing today was waiting for developments, he might want to consider attending the day's classes. This was promptly shot down.

"I realize what you're trying to do," Mark said, putting a pencil down to hold his page open. "Some kind of rain dance to drum up some action—you know the minute I'm past that gate _something'_s gonna happen, right?"

"You're awfully superstitious for a guy who's trying to develop a legal mind, ya know that?" the judge groused. "I'm just saying, the clerking work's a little thin around here today, that's all."

"Yeah, well," Mark muttered, picking up the pencil again, "I'm staying busy." He stared down at the page in front of him for another long moment before he added, "I dunno, when I got accepted to law school—this is going to sound stupid, I know—but what kinda flashed through my head was _court_: the big moment when the closing statement gets presented and the jury's sitting there, rapt. Or the witness trips in cross-examination and lets out something they didn't mean to say."

"Perry Mason stuff, huh? I thought you knew better."

"Nobody ever told me about _Pennoyer v. Neff_."

"I toldja that one's some kinda initiation ceremony. It never gets that bad again."

"Well, outlines, all this stuff." Mark gestured with a sweeping hand to the piles and drifts before him. He slumped back into the sofa. "I think I missed it a little yesterday."

"What?"

Mark sighed. "The damn simplicity of it all: 'fetch, chase, find—phone home.'"

"You need more practice with that last part," the judge pointed out. And then, "You havin' second thoughts?"

He wasn't. At least he didn't think so, but he had to think about it before he could answer so, by definition, he supposed he was.

But, after giving it due thought, he answered fairly decisively, "_No_—no, not really. It's just nice to be Tonto again, once in a while."

And just then the Lone Ranger's phone rang.

00000

It was Frank, and Hardcastle obligingly hit the speaker button as McCormick closed his book on the pencil and moved to a closer seat.

"_Your scout's keeping my guys busy_," Frank confided.

"Careful, Frank, I got ya on the speaker. Don't give him a swelled head."

"And anyway, Scout's the horse," Mark observed dryly. "But any luck?"

"_I've got a man down in South Central keeping an eye on things—nothing happening there."_

"Nothing much happening anywhere today," Hardcastle interjected, grumbling.

"_And Pete's not going by Solanger anymore_," Frank plodded on, ignoring the editorial comment._ "It's Peter Keeft, but there's nothing too sinister about that one. His mom and dad divorced when he was pretty young. Keeft was his step-dad's name and he went by it as a kid. No formal adoption, though._ _Probably had enough paperwork with that on it to make the switch easy. Might be just a lower-profile choice._"

"What about the woman who visited Jake?"

_"That ward clerk of Mark's—her name's Marcella Grodin—she got kinda cagey when I showed her the photos. I think maybe she was worried about getting Jake into some sort of trouble. So we got a big fat goose-egg from her. And Jake said he didn't know the woman from Adam's off-ox and couldn't even remember what she looked like._"

The judge shook his head. "Terrific. But even if we knew for sure that it was Eve, we still wouldn't know if she was there to discourage Solanger, join up with him, or recruit him." He sighed.

"_We did get one thing—took me a while to plow through all the reports from yesterday, but one of your neighbors saw a kid, a teenager, 'black or Hispanic male, middle height and weight,' cutting through the back of his property about the right time yesterday—heading away from your place._"

"Not much of a description," Mark pointed out.

"_It gets a little better_. _The kid was seen climbing into a 'light-colored van, older, paneled sides'—which then departed in a hurry. This was right before the fire department arrived on scene."_

"Nothing more specific about the van?"

"_Not everyone has your knack for ID'ing vehicles, Mark._"

"I don't know why not," the younger man said with disgust, "they all _look_ different."

Hardcastle, more to the point, added, "And the gun from South Central?"

"_They're still working on that. There may be a couple usable partials, besides a very clear right index and thumb that I'm pretty sure are going to bounce back with Mark's name on them."_

The accused flinched. "Sorry—I didn't have a pencil."

"_I thought you always carried one of those these days."_

"Anyway," Mark reached up to rub the back of his neck, "that's pretty much a side issue. _Those_ kids weren't helping Pete kill our roses."

_"Well, we'll just keep doing our bit for law and order. Besides, if we can tag the kid, then we can give Solanger a valid reason to come down to the station—a line-up. Nothing to get the press all excited, just more senseless street crime. You think he'd like that?"_

"Nah," Hardcastle interjected. "He'd just say they're misguided youths I'll bet."

They both heard an "_Um-hmm_," from the other end, not particularly weighted, and then, sounding like a man with a schedule who intended to get on with it, the lieutenant said, "_There's nothing else you guys are holding back on me, is there?"_

"Come on, Frank, do we—"

"_Only when you think I might not approve of what you're up to_," Harper interjected. "_Mark, keep me posted_." And that was followed abruptly by the sound of Frank's receiver settled, with no undue force, back in the cradle.

Hardcastle cast a long, suspicious look at his clerk.

Mark merely shrugged and said, "Can't help it if the guy knows you, Judge. Anyway we're not up to anything—for once." Then he frowned and added, "Are we?"

Hardcastle ignored that and dropped back a minute or so in the conversation. "So now you think Pete's the one, huh? I wish you'd make up your mind about that."

"Yeah, so do I. I've been back and forth on it about five times." He looked up suddenly. "You know, if it _is_ him, it might just be because he doesn't want to be dragged out in the open again—wants to go on being Brother Peter and giving the kids a safe place to crash."

"And all the red paint they need," the judge pointed out. "Besides, weren't you the guy who was all bent out of shape about the Lydia?"

Mark grimaced. He didn't sound wholly convinced when he added, "We can always get another Lydia—"

"Says the man who hasn't priced roses lately."

"Judge." The younger man kept his tone quiet and reasonable, but it was still a request for understanding, which made the next part just a little harder than Hardcastle had thought it was going to be.

"I'm going to restart the trial—" He got no further than that before he saw Mark's mouth open in opposition but he held up a hand, palm forward, forestalling the objection. "I don't even intend to necessarily have the subpoena served. It's enough that he knows we know who and where he is and intend to proceed."

"You just want to poke the hornet's nest and see what flies out," Mark said practically. "Even though there's a good chance they'll be coming after you."

"Okay, so I'm ready this time. And we've got somebody on Pete—and if they're any good, Pete won't know that."

"He says he's got 'good reflexes'. Or he may always assume he's being watched by the Man."

The judge shrugged. "Generalized paranoia won't get him very far. If it's him—whether it's because he's lying and he still believes in the cause, or if it's just because he's publicity shy—he'll have do _something_."

"And what if it's not him?"

"Who then? You think Eve's running this show?"

"Why not?"

The judge shrugged again. "Then we may finally get a line on her . . . and we can serve her a subpoena, too." He grinned broadly at the obvious practicality of it—two birds with one stone.

McCormick had his lips set in a thin line. Hardcastle's smile slipped a little.

"Well," the judge bluffed on, "you gotta admit, it's probably going to shake something loose."

"You," Mark griped, "from your shaky grip on reality." He sighed. "And when do you figure this announcement should get made?"

"Have to notify the parties," the judge admitted. "I can have that done today: reconvene tomorrow—nine sharp. I'm thinking a little press release this afternoon."

Then he frowned, and added just a little more soberly, "But after the rush hour might be best."


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter Seven—The Best Laid Plans**

Mark didn't return to his case outlines. It had been an exercise in futility anyway. Instead he conducted a secondary survey of the garden.

He did his best to ignore the paint-on-brick issue. Even dry the paint had retained its scarlet hue, unlike the blood it had undoubtedly been intended to invoke. Mark had seen enough blood to know the difference on a visceral level: the bag Frank had handed to him a few days after the Weed Randall debacle, the one from the hospital emergency room that had contained the judge's ruined shirt and stained robe.

No, this was still just paint. Hardcastle had already called a power washing service.

The roses were more his department. It was one of those areas of expertise that had gotten picked up almost by accident. Not that he considered himself an expert by any means, but enough of one from practical experience to know what could be saved, and what could not.

The wanton destruction had left many of the plants in the latter category. He might trim a few and take a wait-and-see approach, but he suspected the outcome would be the same. From that his thoughts turned to Solanger, and the man's own damaged flock.

It wasn't all that long before he realized it, having broken through to the surface like the dirt-clotted root he'd just uncovered. His subconscious, at least, had declared the man innocent—of these recent transgressions, anyway. Not that his subconscious hadn't screwed up once or twice in the past, but it was far more reliable than any other system he'd used for character assessment.

He frowned at the Lydia. Definitely unsalvageable. The roses weren't even at their prime in this late summer heat. Somebody had told those kids what to do. And that somebody had said to do _this_.

_It was Eve._

It might have come from the same place in his subconscious that had been busy exonerating Pete—and that could be dangerous—but the notion had taken hold. Eve had met Hardcastle, albeit from the distance of the defense table, back when Nancy was still alive. There would have been ample time for her to follow his fortunes and misfortunes even from the cloister of Frontera.

Hell, her mother had been well-heeled, and probably well-connected. She could easily have traveled in some of the same circles as Mrs. Hardcastle. The Best SoCal Garden award—that must've made the local papers back then, as well as having had a spread in the magazine that had sponsored the contest. Eve knew whose roses these had been and why Hardcastle had them tended so assiduously

_Pete wouldn't know a rose from a gardenia . . . and even if he did, he wouldn't understand what __these__ roses meant to Hardcastle. _

He straightened up, tossed the latest corpse onto the accumulating pile, set the garden spade against the nearest tree, and dusted his hands on his pants. It was good timing; a paneled van with a graphic on the side, "Graffiti-to-Go", had pulled into the back drive, apparently having been given detailed directions by the judge as well as clearance to get past the now omnipresent cops at the gate.

Mark stepped over the pile of dead plants and met the driver as he climbed out of his vehicle and checked his clipboard.

"Hardcastle?"

Mark shook his head. "Just the hired hand. There's your project." He pointed to the wall between back steps and garage door.

The driver, having turned, gave the mess a stare and then with a sad shake of the head said, "The abstract stuff, I don't get it," as he turned to unlock the back of his van.

Mark had to nod his agreement, but he didn't stick around to supervise. Instead he headed back into the house, snagged a couple of Pop Tarts from the cupboard, and strolled through the dining room to the front of the house. The judge was ensconced behind his desk, papers and clippings spread before him.

"The power washing guy is here," Mark announced.

"Good," the older man grunted. "Frank called again. They're still chasing down leads on Eve. So far they've got an apartment on Sepulveda, one of those big complexes where nobody knows who their neighbors are."

"Makes sense."

"No grounds for a search warrant yet," Hardcastle grumbled, sounding as if he were hoping there would be, soon. "And Harper's guys couldn't find anyone in the building who'd seen anybody around her place lately." He let out a heavy sigh and flipped another page over. "I dunno—kinda low rent. Might just be a mail drop and an address for tax purposes."

The man had barely raised his eyes from what was in front of him. Mark recognized parts of the Red Fist file but didn't make any wagers about the likelihood of Hardcastle encountering anything new in there.

Instead he asked, with polite nonchalance, "Mind if I borrow a picture of her?"

Hardcastle looked up at him sharply and said, "What for?" with a mostly unjustified note of suspicion. Which was to say, it might be justified but Mark was hard-pressed to know how he could possibly have made up his mind so quickly. After all, he himself had only decided what he was going to do with it somewhere between the dining room and the den.

"Ohh," he said, drawing it out with an indecisive air, as though he hadn't quite made up his own mind if it was worth bothering about, "I thought I'd maybe run over to Palm View and have another chat with Ms. Grodin—the clerk, you know?"

"Why?" Hardcastle asked, still sounding deeply suspicious. "Harper already tried—nothing. _Nada_."

"Well, yeah, but he didn't bond with her over a crossword puzzle, one clerk to another."

Hardcastle was still frowning slightly, but turned his attentions back to the piles before him.

"Anyway," Mark continued on, still casual, "I'd hate to have left her with the impression that I was some kind of snitch or something, plying her with missing words while I pumped her for information."

The judge looked up again from rummaging through the papers. "That was kinda what you did, wasn't it?"

Mark made a face as he reached for what had now been extracted. He flipped the pictures toward himself—the standard mug shot poses. He sighed.

"You don't happen to have something a little more _casual_, do you?"

Hardcastle grunted and did a little more digging. "Here, headshot from a magazine article—older, though."

Mark took that one and gave it a thorough inspection. Eve was younger in this photo, but looked more individually human and less like the cultural archetype that a mug shot always invokes.

"Yeah," he said, "this." Her calm gray eyes stared out at him: confident, _intense_. The woman they were searching for was about sixteen years older than that photo, but he suspected that some things, at least, hadn't changed.

He took both it and the mug shots and slipped them into the pocket of the jacket he'd left slung over the back of a chair. He shoved the last chunk of Pop Tart into his mouth and mumbled around it, "Issued that statement to the press yet?"

"Uh-uh." The judge glanced down at his watch. "It's only three. I was thinking maybe five, five-thirty. In time to get tagged for the evening news."

"As long as it doesn't become: 'Fire Guts Malibu Estate—film at eleven'," Mark intoned dramatically. "Anyway, I can get there by shift change, talk to Marcella before she gets busy, and maybe get half-way back before all hell breaks loose. Don't look for me too early."

With that he made for the steps and was at the door before the judge could come up with his sole piece of advice, uttered with the kind of loud conviction that carried easily to the hallway.

"Call me before you do anything stupid, okay?"

Mark grinned and was gone.

00000

Though it seemed as if more then twenty-four hours had passed since he'd last visited the place, the Palm View looked unchanged by its little brush with current events and police procedure. Mark had had a half-inkling that this might even be Marcella's day off and wondered why he hadn't at least called ahead.

_Because you wanted to surprise her._

Most likely the truth, he admitted to himself. He even took the stairway again. He found the object of his journey sitting in her usual place. No crossword this time—she was staring moodily at the TV mounted high on the opposite wall, facing her desk at nearly a right angle.

Her glance jogged toward him, though, as he sauntered up to the counter, and it was quickly followed by a look of uneasy disdain.

"_You_."

"Mark," he said, reaching over and offering a hand, "McCormick."

There was no reciprocation. He sighed and withdrew, but still leaned slightly against the Formica top.

"You should have told me," she said sullenly.

"What?" His response was all innocence.

"That you're a cop. Aren't you supposed to tell people?"

"But I'm not," Mark protested mildly.

Her frown was now puzzled. "But—"

"I'm a student—a law student. I'm just working, um, part-time, for that guy who was with me. He's a judge."

This hadn't done anything to clear the younger woman's expression.

"See, he's presiding over a case—maybe you heard about it?"

She apparently had, at least since this morning. There was a small nod.

"It's an old one, see? And the judge, well, he didn't like the idea that most of the witnesses hadn't been located, so he was trying to find some of them."

Marcella wrinkled her nose slightly—an apparent variation on confusion. "Do judges do stuff like that?"

"This one does," Mark assured her. "Anyway, that woman who came here Friday—the one you didn't think was Jake's daughter—he thinks she might be one of those witnesses, that's all." He'd left out his own burgeoning suspicions, speaking _ex parte_—strictly from Hardcastle's perspective of the needs of the judicial process.

Marcella softened somewhat. "Well, why didn't that detective say something like that?"

Mark could imagine Harper at his most harried and brusque, approaching her, mug shots in hand. Maybe he'd been picturing it all along. He reached into his own pocket and carefully extracted just the one photo.

"Could you look at this one? It's a different picture. I know it's kinda old but—" He held it out and she received it graciously enough.

If he'd been waiting for a eureka moment, he would have been disappointed. But he wasn't. After all, she'd only seen the woman once, and the photo was Eve at nearly half the age she'd be now. Still, Marcella gave it her best effort, maybe now almost eager to please.

"The hair's different." She cocked her own head. "The nose, the shape of her face—maybe." She finally shook her head and handed it back. "I dunno. I'm not that good with faces. I can't say for sure."

Mark took the photo and tucked it back in, carefully. He nodded and gave the woman a small but sincere smile. "It's okay. I understand. But thanks for trying."

"You know, I just didn't want to make any trouble for Jake—Pete either. He seemed pretty upset."

"Jake?

"No, well, _yeah_, but Jake's upset a lot. But I meant Pete, Friday."

Mark frowned. "You mean Pete knew about it—that this woman was looking for him?"

Marcella nodded casually.

"You didn't mention that."

"Nobody asked."

Mark gave her a sharp, questioning look.

"Well," she confessed reluctantly, "that detective did. But he was so . . . _so_—"

"Grumpy?"

Marcella thought that one over very briefly and then nodded.

"But she was here first on Friday," Mark said, "and she was gone before Pete showed up?"

Another nod.

"And you told him she'd been here?"

"Uh-huh. And he looked surprised and asked me what she looked like, which I'll admit I thought was pretty strange, and that was another reason I figured she wasn't Jake's daughter."

That she'd had any such list of reasons was news to Mark as he silently kicked himself for not having stuck around to finish the crossword puzzle.

"This woman," he began cautiously, "she didn't say or do anything else, like maybe ask you for her long lost brother's address or something?"

"She did, but I didn't have it and, anyway, that would be against policy, giving something like that out."

So, too, was probably half the conversation they'd just had, Mark supposed, but that had not been an impediment to the now very-reasonable Marcella.

"I told her she should ask Jake," she concluded sensibly.

Mark could imagine how _that_ went. He glanced over his shoulder briefly, down the hall. He didn't feel quite up to tackling the indomitable Jake right now. And, anyway, he thought he owed Hardcastle a phone call.

He turned back toward the counter. "If you think of anything else, could you call the number that police lieutenant gave you?"

Marcella made a little face, but finally nodded.

"He's a nice guy," Mark assured her. "Just having a bad week."

_And aren't we all._

He gave her one final nod, a tip of an invisible hat, and a quick, mostly grateful smile, before departing.

In the stairwell he contemplated his next move—after calling Hardcastle, that is. He was definitely going to keep an eye out for a phone. Of course once the judge heard the news he'd probably relay it on to Frank, pronto, and reel his clerk in.

On the other hand, the mysterious woman—who Mark was now tentatively calling Eve just for the sake of simplicity—having had a chance to observe Pete's arrival and departure Friday evening, opened up a whole new range of possibilities. Had she talked to him? He would have sworn, based on his own conversation with Solanger that she hadn't. But following him--that seemed a more distinctly likely possibility.

If so, did she send those other emissaries: the three convenient 'delinquents' who'd been on hand—practically a welcoming committee—on Monday night? And, for true simplicity's sake, could they be the same crew she'd dispatched to the estate yesterday afternoon? A diligent bunch, pulling a double shift like that, and in a van intentionally intended to make things a little hotter for Pete, as well.

Those thoughts carried him as far as the parking lot. He cast one acerbic glance in the direction of the only visible phone, undoubtedly still as useless as the night before. As a gesture of sincerity, though, he was scrabbling in his pocket, not just for his keys, but also for the change he'd need when he finally did find a working one.

And that's what he was doing, practically at the rear bumper of the Coyote, when he felt the familiar prod of something blunt yet dangerous from behind, up under his ribs.

He glanced back over his shoulder, starting to turn. Another prod answered that and a young voice said, with a pretty convincing attempt at menace, "Hands out. Move slow. This one's yours, huh?"

Meaning the Coyote, Mark supposed, and he nodded a slow yes. He could see his assailant from the corner of his eye now, and was fairly convinced he was the one who'd brought the other gun to last night's party.

He willed the kid to order him into the driver's seat. It'd still be tricky, but a ton and a quarter of iron and steel was even more useful than a tire iron in the right hands.

The kid might have been tempted. Maybe he was already toting the car up as one of the spoils of the revolution, but apparently he'd been put in charge for good reason. He must've seen the dangers in letting his captive drive.

"Back away," he ordered. And then, "Over here."

Mark had to guess which way that was, the gun's muzzle staying planted firmly in his side. A quick glance around, though, and he spotted the van—an Econoline, conveniently enough, but a year younger than Solanger's edition. It was either an incredible coincidence, or the sign of careful planning.

"In there, the back."

Mark saw the right door opening, and in the ill-lit interior, amid the shadowy outline of some supplies, another figure awaited them.

"_In_," the kid with the gun said more urgently. "You're gonna go see a lady about something."

Caution overcame reluctance and, besides, weren't they looking for Eve Ostermann? He climbed aboard awkwardly and felt—before he could even get settled on the floor amid the clutter—his wrists yanked back and the application of one of those plastic strips, the kind cops use when they have too many arrestees and not enough handcuffs. _Better_ than handcuffs, in Mark's glum opinion, because they weren't amenable to being picked.

He could only sigh and approve of their fairly professional approach, though he was guessing none of these guys was old enough to be legally driving and all three combined had less practical experience with kidnapping than he did. A second restraint now cinched his ankles and the back door to the van was slammed shut. The gun-wielder was briefly on the other side of it, but he rejoined them a moment later, climbing into the passenger seat, gun now carefully out of sight.

There was no way to keep track of where they were going, and no APB out on this vehicle. It would take a lucky break to get them pulled over for some driving infraction, and it seemed as though the kid behind the wheel was taking no chances.

How long before he was overdue at home? Or before someone noticed a fancy sports car being neglected in the lot of the Palm View? After visiting hours, most likely. He settled back for the ride.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter Eight--Kids with Guns  
**

Hardcastle has spoken to Briston at the DA's office and gotten word to Loki, somewhere in the bowels of Men's Central, that he would be reconvening in the morning. He'd been half-tempted to deliver that second copy of the message himself—to fill Loki in on what they currently knew about his potential witness list and see if he couldn't coax a few motions out of the man, maybe even get him to agree to formal counsel.

The judge sat at his desk, pondering. Restarting the trial was merely a means to an end in the greater investigation now, but he couldn't lose sight of the fact that it was also a trial, with all the ramifications thereunto. Not that he didn't know a passel of ways to put the brakes on, but many of those wrenches were intended to be thrown into the works by wily defense attorneys.

Meanwhile, he kept the announcement to the press short and to the point—just a hint of mystery that would guarantee it newsworthy—and issued it at 5:20. He hoped that would be late enough to forestall any serious strike on the evening's rush hour. He turned the radio on and dialed to the news station shortly after that, but the first consequence of his move was the doorbell.

He glanced over his shoulder out the front window and saw Frank's company car—with the man himself on the front stoop, no doubt. The judge rose with a sigh and shuffled up the steps to answer a second, more impatient summons from the bell.

"Tried to call you," Harper grumbled in greeting as soon as the door swung open. "_Twice_." He stepped in without any need for an invitation and headed into the den like a man who already had a favorite chair and knew where it was.

He was, and he did. Hardcastle followed him down and reassumed his own place at the desk. Not that he was studying the file any more.

"I was getting the word out," Milt said. "You were next. I'm getting the trial rolling again—gonna start 'er up tomorrow morning."

"I figured it was some harebrained thing like that." Frank grimaced. "You know, I don't mind your stirring the pot, but I would've liked a heads-up." He reached for the desk phone.

The judge sat back, curbing his own impatience. He had fully intended to call Frank next, but only to argue that too much official police response might stifle creativity on the part of the Fist. It would be a delicate balance between being prepared, and not looking too much so.

He was also aware, as he listened to Frank's staccato list of instructions to underlings, that he'd been tying up the phone more than he'd realized this past hour or so. McCormick was by no means overdue, but now that the shit was officially en route to the fan, he'd like to know where the man was. It was simple logistics.

It could be that they'd lost a little of their edge this past half-year or so, with the bad guy-busting aspects of their partnership on mothballs. Not that McCormick had ever been a reliable minion before that. He'd never really been cut-out for minionhood, the judge suspected. It was probably time to face facts about that. He took a deep breath and let it out.

Frank was hanging up, looking just a little less peeved. He made a lousy minion too, but he was pretty good at grasping a situation on the fly.

"I know you don't want anybody from the Fist getting spooked, but I'm not leaving you out here with minimal coverage—and if I did, they would figure _that_ was suspicious, right?

Hardcastle had to nod his agreement.

"By the way, got a match back on those partials: a kid named Artois Miller. Minor beefs, some gang stuff, nothing real recent. Just the kind who'd be shaking folks down for some pin money."

Frank had been glancing around, even as he'd been speaking. Now he frowned, as if he'd finally registered what was missing. He cocked his head toward his friend and asked, "Where's Mark?"

00000

A fifteen-year-old with a box cutter is hardly ever a good thing, but this one, having kept a wary silence for the length of the trip—maybe thirty minutes at most—merely leaned forward and sliced through the ankle cinch once the vehicle had halted. The return of feeling was uncomfortable enough that Mark knew he wasn't going to be running for a couple of minutes. He did manage to slide to the edge and stand, once the doors were open and he was ordered out.

The kid with the gun was back in charge. He wielded it freely, gesturing with it, though not extravagantly, now that they were inside a warehouse-type structure.

From behind him came the brisk approach of heeled shoes and a female voice said, "You got him?" Then, as Mark started to turn—looking over his shoulder as he did—he heard a sharp intake of breath and a querulous, "Who the hell is _he_?"

"The guy from last night," the kid-with-gun said.

There was a tone of resentment to it, and Mark realized his arrival with tire iron, while not the proximate cause of failure in the attack on Solanger, had been noted and tallied against him by the participants.

"Mark," he said politely, still straining to see who he was talking to. "McCormick."

The kid was gesturing for him to hold his position.

"Oh, _him_." The woman sounded just slightly less irritated. And then, apparently to her minions, "What about Solanger?"

Mark wondered briefly if she'd been crazy enough to expect them to kidnap Jake from his room in the home, but no—

"He never showed," the kid said peevishly. "But this guy was there."

There was a heavy, impatient sigh from the woman. "So you just figured you'd ignore what I told you and grab the first person who showed up?"

It looked that way to Mark, though not much like he'd profit from it any. The kid said nothing, just stood there sullenly, with his gun making him somehow look even younger than his probable age. The tableau didn't hold, though. The woman must have gestured for them to come with her. His kidnapper, with the resilience of youth, shed the sullen expression, straightened up, and passed the gesture along. Mark was finally allowed to turn.

There was no need to be prodded anymore. He was herded from a short but safe distance, and the restraint was still on his wrists, anyway. He went docilely. The woman had even had the temerity to turn her back on the whole process, leading the way to a walled-off area with a glass-windowed door—some sort of office space. Now that Mark had a brief opportunity to survey it, he could see that the whole interior of the building had an empty, just-rented look.

The survey didn't last long. He was at the door and being given a wholly unnecessary shove inside that made him stumble on his still uncertain feet. The petty aggression wasn't missed by the woman, who frowned at it.

She pointed to a utilitarian chair and Mark sat in it, noticing for the first time that there was a radio playing—background noise, but it was tuned to the news station. That might get messy, he thought briefly, and wondered just how much time had passed. It could be close to six.

But his real interest was in the woman, and not merely because she had his life in her hands. He was having a hard time, despite everything, thinking of these people as murderers. Incidental committers of negligent homicide, perhaps, but not the cold-blooded types.

He studied her face as she seemed to be doing much the same to him. It looked right to him, factoring in the sixteen years—six of them spent in a women's prison and three more in the parole system. There was hardness there, but still the same intensity of the eyes.

_Which were brown._

He was so startled that he very nearly said something aloud. His mouth opened at any rate, and it was fortunate for him, in an unfortunate way, that into the sudden silence fell the irrevocable words from the radio announcer:_ "And in local news . . ."_

Prescience had never felt so damn awkward. He almost squirmed in his seat waiting for the shoe to drop. At the same time he felt an aggravating desire to whip out that photo one more time, just to be sure—the kids had done nothing more than a perfunctory pat-down on him, looking for weapons back when he'd first been stowed in the van. But, anyway, he didn't think his investigative skills were _that_ rusty. This wasn't Eve Ostermann.

But then who the hell was she?

Right now she looked like an increasingly perturbed woman. The reporter had batted out the announcement, along with three or four other late-breaking stories, none of which involved unusually bad traffic on the LA freeways.

_Of course not—the cadre is too busy with a kidnapping._

He watched her anger unfolding and reassessed her potential as a killer. If she was—and he really had no grounds to judge just yet—the next few minutes could be critical. And he still didn't know for certain who she wanted him to believe she was.

_Ask._

It seemed as good a conversational gambit as any. He tried not to sound too tentative as he framed the question as innocently as possible.

"You're Eve—Eve Ostermann?"

Her gaze had been drawn to the radio. Now it snapped back to him. "Suppose I am, you have a subpoena?"

"No," Mark admitted. "I'll admit we've been looking for you, if you're Eve."

The woman let out a long sigh and she said, with what seemed to be real sincerity, "It's never going to end, is it? Sixteen _years_."

It sounded remarkably like Solanger's tone from the night before. Mark supposed from their end it seemed that way. He shook his head slightly, trying not to lose sight of the idea that this was _not_ Eve. And sixteen years was nothing compared to the consequences of that fiery night for the lone security guard.

_But if she's not Eve, what's her interest in all this?_ There hadn't been any other woman involved in the case. Eve had no sisters, no female close associates.

_Not then._

There was no denying it, except for that one inescapable variation this woman had met every other expectation he'd had. She seemed prison-hardened.

She also seemed to have made up her mind. She snapped her fingers at one of the two other boys and said, "Get the phone."

He trotted off and returned a short while later with a leather bag a little narrower than a shoebox. He put it on the otherwise uncluttered desk that was up against the wall to Mark's left.

"He wants to see me? Okay," she said brusquely as she undid zippers and unpacked what she needed, "we'll arrange it." She had the bulky but self-contained dial-and-receiver unit out. "You're going to call your Judge Hardcastle and invite him down. I'll dial; you'll talk. You'll tell him that you've found the kid you almost grabbed last night and he wants to make a deal. He even gave you a name—Artie Miller."

The kid with the gun—who _still_ had the gun—started to say something in protest.

"Shh," the woman said, almost like a stern librarian. And then, still to the boy, "You let them get that gun last night. You think they haven't ID'd you yet?" Then she softened. "Don't worry."

Mark had heard that tone before—the one that could make an approval-needy kid do whatever needed doing. It was working for Artie. He subsided with barely a murmur and the woman turned her attention back to the call and the plan.

"He says he'll _only_ talk to Hardcastle and he has a lot to say—got that? He sees cops and he'll run. If he can't run, he'll clam up. He knows what happens to snitches."

Mark nodded. As stories went it had the ring of truth. If he could have gotten the drop on Artie, this might have been precisely the way it would have gone down.

"And what happens to Hardcase?" He felt obligated to ask, though he already had his own opinion about it.

"Nothing serious," she assured him smoothly. "Hell, he can depose me right here. I just can't go into open court—not again. I have my reasons."

Mark managed to avoid an obvious grimace, though he wasn't sure how much longer he could go on pretending to believe this increasingly leaky crock. He wasn't a street-needy fifteen-year-old anymore. But she seemed to be used to being taken at her word. She was already dialing the phone—the number at the estate, and apparently from memory.

He was thinking fast, weighing out his options. Outright refusal would probably only succeed in moving her along to plan B: shoot him and ambush the judge—that was at least the worst-case scenario. Full compliance with the message would prove that he could be useful, but bring the unsuspecting ambushee to her.

That was about as far as he'd gotten when she shoved the phone next to his face, her finger still poised on the cut-off button, and there was only half a ring before the ambushee himself picked up and—being also unusually prescient—growled, "_McCormick?_"

"Told you I'd call," Mark said cheerfully.

"_'Bout time_."

"Yeah, well, about that," he encountered a warning look from the woman holding the phone and gave her a small placating nod as he continued, "something came up. That kid from last night, the one with the gun?"

"_Yeah, we got a name on him_."

Hardcastle's voice carried well and Mark spared a glance for Artie, who looked properly subdued.

"Artie Miller?" Mark asked.

There was a pause on Hardcastle's end and then a sharp, "_Okay, Marcella didn't know that—_"

"Ran into him after I left Palm View. Actually, he followed me." He went into the spiel, as he'd been instructed, nothing fancy.

"_Where does he want to meet?_" Hardcastle asked, with no more than an ordinary level of suspiciousness. Mark hoped that was clear to his captor.

It must have been, because she'd been hastily scribbling something on a scrap of paper on the desk with her free hand while he'd talked. She now held it up. Mark read it off, trying not to sound as if he were reading it off.

He could almost hear the reciprocal scribbling at Hardcastle's end. Really, these mobile phones were amazing. Now all he needed was one question—_any_ reasonably open-ended question would do, just as long as it demanded some sort of answer. He just couldn't look like he was leading the witness.

"_How the hell'd ya get way over there?"_ the judge groused.

Just what he'd wanted—a nice fat meatball. He casually hit it out of the park, all the while struggling to make it look like an unexpected challenge.

"Yeah, well, you wanted me to drop off those papers for Judge Moreland, remember?"

To anybody else, he might have left off that 'remember?' But if Hardcase bungled this one, Mark figured they both deserved to be shot.

The Lone Ranger did not fail him. The hesitation on his end might have been measured in milliseconds before he returned an equally casual, if somewhat embarrassed, "_Oh, yeah, must've slipped my mind_."

"So you'll come?" Mark asked with a little more confidence.

"_Yeah,_" Hardcastle grumped, completely in character now, "_but this better be good._"

The woman was making a 'wrap it up' sign with her free index finger and Mark didn't want to make her nervous now so he just replied, "It will be, I promise. See you later."

She disconnected the call.

00000**  
**

Hardcastle sat back in his seat, frowning grimly.

Harper, still sitting across from him, said, "What the hell was that all about? Wasn't Moreland—"

"Yeah," Milt grunted, "the guy who faked his way onto the bench—served umpteen years and built his whole career on a stolen diploma." His eyes narrowed sharply. "So somebody's not who they say they are, and McCormick wasn't in a position to just come right out and say it."

"And Artois Miller is working for this person, looks like."

"Okay," the judge pinched the bridge of his nose. "There's only one player left, that's Ostermann. Is this all starting to make some sort of crazy sense? Eve inherits a bucket of money, but now somebody else is spending it, and the last thing she wants is to have to take the stand in a court case, right?"

"Sounds right to me," Harper admitted.

"So Fake Evie will do just about anything to derail this trial—all the while preferably putting the heat on Solanger." He looked up at his wall clock. "Gotta get over to that meeting."

"Are you nuts?"

Hardcastle shrugged as he stood. "Yeah, probably, but you tell me what else I'm supposed to do—I let your guys crash the party without me and McCormick ends up dead, or worse."

"You're gonna have to explain that 'worse' part to me sometime." Frank was on his feet as well. "You'll need a vest and a wire, and I gotta put a team together."

00000

Mark's moment of utter confidence dissipated fairly quickly. It wasn't that he thought Hardcastle hadn't understood the reference—_that_ was one of those striking, hand-tinted memories, replete with his own niece's attempted kidnapping, and a few images even more vivid still.

It was what the man intended to _do_ with the forewarning that now had Mark worried. He was hunkered down toward the back of the warehouse, which was now shrouded in shadow, still restrained, and still opposite an increasingly nervous kid with a gun. And he was ready to offer better than even odds that, despite everything, Hardcastle intended to walk through that door.

The other two kids were now armed as well. Just handguns, as far as Mark had seen, and neither had seemed all that comfortable with a weapon, but they'd been stationed in such concealment as the place offered, in positions flanking him and Artie.

The woman who wasn't Eve had gone further back still. They'd heard her heels clicking on the concrete floor. Mark didn't know if she was armed, but he'd have been surprised if she wasn't.

Minutes were passing and he hadn't yet come up with a plan that would work with both hands behind his back.

On the other hand—they hadn't thought to gag him yet.

"How old are you?" he asked Artie softy, as if in passing. He got no answer but a wary stare from the young man and after a silent moment Mark sighed. "Doesn't matter, really. If you kill a judge—_execute_ him, like this—they'll try you as an adult."

It was a simple statement, and possibly even true. He had Artie's undivided attention now, and it was obvious that the kid wanted to raise an objection. Mark looked unconcerned about what he might say. He let his eyes go slightly out of focus, as though he were concentrating on getting something just right, which he was.

"'The victim was a judge or former judge of any court of record in the local, state, or federal system in this or any other state, and the murder was intentionally carried out in retaliation for, or to prevent the performance of, the victim's official duties.'"

"_Huh_?" Artie looked at him like he was channeling spirits. Which in a way he was: the spirit of the law—or rather the letter of it: California Penal Code, section 190.2. It had been a matter of recent interest to McCormick.

"It's the special circumstance of the case," he said quietly, "the one that will make you eligible for the death penalty."

Artie quirked a nervous half-smile. "They don't gas nobody no more."

"No," Mark agreed soberly, "not really, but they have mandatory sentencing, and life without parole—that's what you'll get. You and your posse—they're your friends, aren't they?"

It took Artie a moment to realize another question had been put to him and then he nodded distractedly. "Yeah, my crew—Jesse's my cousin."

"Doesn't mean you'll end up in the same hole, though," Mark said philosophically. "They usually make sure they split ya up—and it's every man for himself inside anyway."

"How the hell would you know?" Artie said, pulling his defenses together.

Mark shrugged. "I work for that judge you're gonna spend the rest of your life in prison for killing. I've seen 'em—the ones that come out. Not that you're gonna be one of _those_.

"Listen," he lowered his head a little, as though imparting a secret, "they weren't really doing anybody any favors when they turned off the gas. Life's a long time in there. And you won't get out of this. Hardcase is so paranoid, he'll have back-up, you wait and see. How the hell do you think he got that name? You may get him, but then they'll get you. And if they don't, _she_ will."

He was on a roll now. To Artie's increasing look of self-doubt he only smiled. "Why do you think she stayed to the back? You three to do the shooting and her to cap you—then out the back door."

Artie's worried glance went in that direction. He undoubtedly knew where the exits were.

"Or," Mark suggested quietly, "_you_ can take charge, call your crew off." _And how the hell's he going to do that? _He let his confident demeanor slip a little, then quickly shored it up. "You've got a signal?"

"Yeah," Artie said, "I shoot first."

_That's pretty basic._ "Then don't," he said simply. "Make the bitch do her own work for a change," he spat. "How much is she paying you? Never mind," he interrupted himself. "Whatever it is, it won't cover the time."

"I'm no narc," Artie said stiffly.

"You save yourself, and save your crew. The only one who goes down is her, and she wants you dead when this is over."

Artie was frowning, brow furrowed and eyes narrowed. It appeared he had an innate understanding of tactics and was nobody's fool, except maybe for the siren's call of a woman who had treated him like a man—armed him and sent him out to do a man's job. But betrayal is a powerful motivator, especially in a case like that.

"Not a narc," Mark reminded gently, "just a guy trying to save his crew."

There wasn't any more time. He heard the latch on the front door rattle, and saw the door opening. It was past twilight and there was nothing to backlight the doorway, but he heard Hardcastle's voice.

"You there? What the hell's going on McCormick?"

This would have been Artie's cue to poke the gun in his face and get him to issue an invitation to enter. Instead he saw the kid maneuver something out of his pocket and thumb it—another one of the ubiquitous box-cutters. He supposed he might be about to get his throat cut but, no, Artie reached around in back and none-too-carefully hacked through the restraint.

It was no favor. Mark hadn't felt anything in his hands for a while now. He wouldn't have been able to take possession of the gun even if Artie had offered it, which he didn't.

"_McCormick?_" The man sounded less patient but still not aware of the danger.

"Get down!" Artie shouted. It was loud enough to take in both his fellow minions and the judge.

From further back there was a curse uttered and then an angry sputter of, "You little—" but nothing after that but a couple of stray shots from a handgun to stay any pursuit, followed by the rapid clatter of heels and the opening and slamming of a door.

"See?" Mark said to Artie, from their positions, side-by-side, as flat as possible on the floor. "Told ya."

"You guys okay?" Artie shouted, getting to his knees a little too soon. It was Mark's considered opinion that one slammed door did not always mean the coast was clear.

But it was. Artie's confused partners in crime were emerging, uninjured. Hardcastle was in the doorway, with a couple of SWAT guys trying to get him to behave. He wasn't having any part of that.

They surged around him and into the place. Artie and his friends, wisely, had put their weapons down and seemed familiar enough with the position required. Mark just stayed down. His hands were starting to hurt like bejeezus, and one of his wrists had a gouge in it—nearly bloodless, he was pleased to note.

Hardcastle strode over, looking down at him and giving the rest of the place a quick once-over, too.

"That was a lot easier than I thought it was gonna be," he said. "You okay?"

"Ask me in a couple of minutes," Mark said, starting to rock a little. Calling this 'pins and needles' didn't really do it justice.

The judge frowned, seeing the gouge start to ooze blood with the belated return of circulation. "I think you better get that looked at." He reached in his pocket for a

hankie.

Frank arrived from the back, with a spare SWAT guy and a prisoner in tow.

"This the only other one?"

He was addressing Mark, who nodded up at him.

"Eve?" Frank asked Hardcastle casually, like a man who already knows the answer.

"Hell no," the judge replied vehemently. "Face is all wrong, nose, hell—the _eyes_ are the wrong color."

"That's what tipped me off," Mark said quietly.

The woman barely looked human by this time, tugging at her guard and her handcuffs, hair awry. Still, Hardcastle was giving her a considering stare.

"But she's familiar." He cocked his head, hands on his hips, as though he were studying a work of art.

_More like a piece of work, _Mark thought. The pain was starting to subside, but he still didn't get up. He tried, and failed, to bend his swollen fingers.

"Ruby something—" the judge finally exclaimed. "Bennett—no Ben_dell_." He looked inordinately pleased with himself.

"I think we'll run her prints anyway," Frank commented dryly.

"Grifter. Check kiter. Small-time stuff but she got sent up to Frontera for second degree murder," Hardcastle added, sounding increasingly sure of his facts. "A boyfriend. She said he was abusive but she shot him six times while he slept. I kinda thought the DA underplayed that one." He turned to the SWAT guy and said, "Just make sure you read her her rights off the card, okay?"

Her temporary guard looked harried as he fished under his body armor for a pocket. Hardcastle merely shook his head and fetched out his wallet, handing the necessary item over. "Keep it, I got more."

With that, and a nod of thanks, Mark's nightmare was led away.

He finally felt like he could use his hand for something, and that was to reach up, thump the side of the judge's knee, and point, clumsily. "That's Artie, the kid who wanted to talk to you."

Having assumed the position, and been frisked, Artie was getting his handcuffs applied—the standard issue variety and to the standard degree.

"Hmm," the judge said.

"Yeah, well, he really does know a lot—him and his two friends, but they were just low-level help. Kids, all of them. The one looks about fourteen and I'm guessing Artie is fifteen. She had them lined up to be your firing squad but Artie said 'No deal'. You might've been on the other side of a concrete wall, but I was in the line of fire."

Hardcastle's expression was a little less reserved.

"It takes a lot," Mark pointed out, "for a fifteen-year-old kid—if he's even _that_—to say no to somebody like Eve . . . I mean Ruth."

"Yeah," Hardcastle grudged. "What kinda deal did you swing 'em?"

"No deal, not exactly," Mark said, finally accepting a hand up. "So you think maybe you can get them some probation time?"

Hardcastle looked sideways at him. "They're not even fingerprinted and you've got me doing sentencing phase. And I'm not even gonna be the judge on that case—temporary assignment, remember? I'm due to retire again after this one."

"I just don't want _you_ to forget, that's all," Mark insisted. "I'd be dead, you might be too, if Artie hadn't seen the light."

He suddenly thought maybe getting up hadn't been such a good idea.

Hardcastle looked down, scowled, and said, "Whadya do with that damn handkerchief?"

The bleeding had started in earnest.


	9. Chapter 9

**Epilogue**

After that, with the pressing need for haste removed, the trial of Arthur Loki fell into a more typical pattern. The judge's clerk—temporarily sidelined due to uncomfortable but not permanent hand injuries—tagged along to observe the proceedings. The press had become bored after a few days and wandered off, all except for a stringer for _The Worker's Daily_—a Berkeley rag which had recently gone bi-weekly—and even _he_ looked disappointed with the defendant's calm and cooperative demeanor.

When Mr. Loki had, with the assistance of his public defender, gotten a continuance in order to properly prepare his defense, even the guy from the Worker threw in the towel. Mr. Peter Solanger's testimony was given a few weeks later, in the course of a very ordinary morning, with no one present in the courtroom but the parties immediately concerned with the trial.

Ms. Eve Ostermann, missing and presumed deceased, was obviously not available, so the statements from Solanger—eyewitness to all of the events in question, and known to the bench to be a valuable member of the social service community—went a long way toward exonerating the defendant of the worst of the charges.

As to the rest, the undeniable flight from justice, the DA agreed that the relatively low culpability of the defendant in the original crimes, combined with his apparent complete ignorance of the other defendants' intent to escape, rendered his actions merely those of a man in immediate fear for his life.

The defense counsel invoked the concept of flagrant necessity, along with an element of coercion in his closing argument, though not failing to admit responsibility, on behalf of his client, for a series of bad judgments. The judge's clerk (now fully recovered but still sneaking out of class whenever possible to see the real-life working of the court), who knew the man's opinions on most things, thought he'd be receptive.

So it came as very little surprise, to Mark McCormick at any rate, that the bench found Arthur Loki not guilty on all but a couple of the lesser charges, and that for those he assigned no further jail time, substituting a moderate period of probation and a decent chunk of community service.

00000

At the trial of Ruth Bendell, Mark played a far more active role—being the chief witness for the prosecution. Naturally that kept him from hearing any of the other testimony, but after the fact (twenty years for kidnapping, battery, and a myriad of other charges including arson and interfering with a trial) he wormed the whole story out of Frank.

"She swears up and down, _still_, that she loved Eve. She finally admitted the woman is dead. From what we figure, the last time anyone saw her—the real Ostermann—had been about five years back. And she had already given Ruth a lot of gifts—money, property.

"Bendell says she died on a camping trip—fell into a river. That's probably not true—I'd say chances are good, though, that she died of natural causes and Ruth disposed of the body. Her death was damn inconvenient, so why would she have killed her? Ostermann had no will as far as anyone knew, and Bendell had no claim to her property."

"So, then she did the logical thing," Mark said, "and just _became_ Eve?"

"More or less," Frank nodded.

"As little as possible, just when she needed to be," Hardcastle observed. "She had a history of cons, grifting—all before the boyfriend incident. She knew a helluva lot more about stealing an identity than Loki did. But it wasn't going to stand up to any close scrutiny, so she couldn't let the Loki case go to trial."

"And the kids—thanks for going to bat for them." Mark nodded toward both men.

"They aren't exactly ready to have their pictures on holy cards ya know," Hardcastle said tartly.

"Yeah," Mark nodded, "but give 'em a year of public service with Brother Pete. He'll shape 'em up."

"What did you stiff Loki with?" Frank asked curiously. "I didn't think he'd be too happy working for Solanger again."

"Nah," Hardcastle said, "found him the perfect gig: the library at Men's Central. It's needed a real librarian for a long time. Might take the whole five hundred hours to get it up and running."

Mark nodded in agreement. "It's a mess. You start ignoring the Dewey Decimal System—maybe let Huck Finn hang out in biographies—and the next thing you know you've got anarchy."


End file.
